Trail of Breadcrumbs
by Objessions
Summary: Tag/Rewrite of Wilderness Training Survival - I loved this episode, but I wanted Jack with the team, and it seemed other people here wanted that too. So this is a rewrite of the episode, with our people all together, just the way the fandom intended.
1. Chapter 1

Trail of Breadcrumbs

 ** _A/N - I loved Wilderness+Training+Survival, but like a lot of you, I wished Jack was there. Rid even said she was hoping for someone to write about it in the note to her beautiful tag to the episode. I've had a lot of stress the last few weeks between some stuff I've had going on personally, my day job, and my professional writing. A tag seemed the perfect way to depressurize, and maybe offer something we're all craving. Here's my version of the episode. As always, I own nothing, but I hope you enjoy what I've done with other people's characters. ~ J_**

"Hey, Jack," Riley said, glancing over her shoulder. "Pass me a drink, wouldja?"

Mac kept his eyes on the road, but couldn't quite help the smirk that appeared on his face.

"Jack?" Riley tried again. "Hey, Old Man!" she said loudly. She was answered by a snore and the sound of Jack's broad form shifting in his seat. Like any good soldier, Jack knew well enough to nap while the napping was good. Mac snickered and Riley sighed, gesturing at Bozer to get his attention away from his phone. "Hey, Bozer, you want to hand me one of those waters back there?"

"Yeah." Bozer opened the cooler, grinning. She could have a water. He was about ready for the Starbucks Frappuccino he'd bought at the gas station a while back. He froze. "Uh … Can't."

Jack snorted awake when Riley loudly demanded to know why. "What're you two bickering about now?" he grumped, rubbing his eyes.

"I think somebody robbed us at that last rest stop," Bozer whined anxiously, tilting the empty cooler he'd just discovered so Jack could see it.

"Aw, Mac! C'mon, man!" Jack huffed.

Mac laughed.

Bozer frowned, trying to catch Mac's eye in the mirror. "Uh, Roomie, why's he yelling at you about people robbing our supplies?"

Mac met Bozer's eye, then looked back at the road. ""Because nobody robbed us. I unpacked the coolers, Boze."

Jack sighed again. "Probably the packs, too, huh?"

Mac tossed him a grin. "You know it, pal."

"Why!?" Bozer demanded.

"Because he's got a sadistic streak," Jack groused, but Mac could hear his partner's amusement.

"Because," Mac said firmly. "Packed coolers are for camping trips. This is wilderness survival training."

"Which he takes insanely serious. Emphasis on the insane part," Jack teased.

Mac laughed. "Says the guy who jumps out of planes recreationally." Mac glanced at Riley who just looked game for whatever he threw at them. "It's not supposed to be fun anyway."

"But it's fun for you. I can tell by the look in your eye," Riley observed.

Mac shrugged. "Usually, yeah. I don't mind roughing it. Which is what we'll be doing."

"And roughing it means no water?" Bozer asked, sounding less enthusiastic by the second.

Mac nodded. "No water, no food, no tents, and no cell phones, certainly," he said pointedly since Bozer's face had been glued to his screen since Oregon at least.

"Here comes the speech about Mother Nature providing everything we need," Jack laughed.

Mac rolled his eyes, making sure Jack saw him in the mirror. But that didn't stop the predicted speech one bit. "Just us and the Great Outdoors," he grinned. "Anything we need we're gonna have to find it or make it."

"So this outdoor survival stuff is right up your alley because it's all about improvising," Riley smiled.

"Kinda," Mac agreed. "And it's important. That's why Matty tasked me with bringing you guys out here. Immersive training is the best way for you to really remember what you've learned. And every agent finds themselves in a survival situation at some point. When it's you out there I want to know I did my part to get you home alive."

"How come the old man gets to come too? I know he knows all about this stuff from too many crappy camping trips when I was a kid," Riley said, throwing Jack a teasing smirk and an eye roll.

"Gets to?" Jack laughed. "You mean has to! I didn't volunteer for this little field trip. I know what our boy here is capable of. Sadistic streak, just like I said."

Mac was grinning a little at the idea of Jack dragging a young Riley and Diane out into the woods on a weekend. "Liar," he chuckled. "Don't let him fool you guys. When Matty asked if I was up for this Jack turned down a pretty cushy security detail for the very attractive daughter of an ambassador that Oversight wanted to send him on just so he could tag along."

"Aw, Jack, that's kind of sweet, you wanting to come out here and protect us," Riley said with a fond smile.

"Yeah, it is," Bozer agreed.

"You wish," Mac laughed. "He wants to see you suffer. Had Tactical taking bets about which one of you would fold and beg for a rescue airlift out of there first."

"Hey!" Jack said, kicking the back of Mac's seat lightly. "It ruins the odds if they know!"

He and Mac cracked up together nonetheless. "Sorry, pal. Wouldn't want to eat into your winnings. I know the Vegas fund is important to you."

"Well, that's just with an eye to retirement, kid. And you and I both know keeping your skinny ass alive is too much of a 24/7 occupation for me to be thinkin' too hard about that just yet."

Mac's eyes flicked to Jack's and he grinned. "Make it up to you with the usual wager?"

"Fifty?"

"Oh, let's make it interesting … A full bill?"

"Each?"

"Greedy bastard," Mac sniffed. "Alright, why not?"

"You two aren't betting on which one of doesn't survive this weekend are you?"

"You're gonna survive," Mac assured him. "You're probably not gonna like it much though," he added with a snicker. Boze had never been one to show much interest in his more outdoorsy adventures, either when they were kids or on weekends once they'd both moved to LA.

"I'm guessing that means no s'mores by the campfire later, huh?"

"Not unless you find yourself a marshmallow tree out there, Boze," Jack said, grinning.

"Is that a thing?" he asked hopefully.

Riley flipped through the guidebook Mac had assigned them both to read. "Says here there's a marshmallow root but … it doesn't sound all that tasty."

"It also doesn't grow in the mountains of Washington," Mac laughed. "But, in addition to its medicinal uses marshmallow root used to be used in candy …"

"Don't!" Jack interrupted. "Don't you start ruining candy. And you two, don't encourage him."

"Encourage me?"

"You know damn well you're already just dyin' to get yourself some gross root and make candy and make us all eat it and all anybody is gonna want by the time we hike outta here is a big ole steak dinner."

Mac snickered. "Alright, but it's not gross."

"Says you," Jack snorted, knowing full well the sorts of culinary adventures the unsuspecting Phoenix agents sharing this ride were in for.

The rest of the ride mostly consisted of Jack dozing back off, Bozer whining about things that hadn't happened yet and were unlikely to happen ever, and Riley flipping through the book and asking Mac questions to clarify things she didn't understand.

"You seem to have a pretty good handle on this, Ri," Mac observed.

She flashed a sort of shy smile. "Well, like I said … Jack was pretty enthusiastic about camping and all that stuff. He thought getting me away from the city, away from all my tech, would be good for me. You know, keep me outta trouble."

"Did it?"

Riley snorted laughter. "Not by half. I used to disassemble my phone and put parts in everybody's gear, then reassemble it when we got to the campsite."

Mac started laughing quietly. "What's so funny?"

"Well first of all, twelve year old you thwarted one of the best operatives I've ever met. And second, I did something like that when I got sent to the training academy. Great minds."

"You snuck your phone to spy school?"

"No, I snuck a burner phone to spy school. Turned out it was a good thing, too."

"Do I get to hear the rest of that story?"

Mac turned on his blinker and pulled into a dusty parking lot out in front of a defunct looking general store. He slid the Jeep into park and tipped her a grin. "Pass this course and I'll tell you the whole thing on the ride back." He paused, suddenly tense. "I wonder if this place is even open … I'd like to park the Jeep here."

He climbed out and the others followed. He and Jack exchanged a look that both Bozer and Riley caught. Jack sighed. "Only one way to find out, kid."

"Um, Mac, where are we?" Bozer asked. "Cuz it looks like the kind of place where serial killers get their start."

"It's fine, Boze. You can grab one last pre-packaged sugar fix to make up for the s'mores you're not gonna get later and I'll just check with the owner and see if I can park the Jeep here over the weekend."

"Owner? What owner? It doesn't look like anyone's been here in years."

Mac and Jack glanced at each other again. Jack called out, "Hello! Anybody home?"

As they walked slowly, somewhat hesitantly across the parking lot, a huge hairy beast of a man lumbered out onto the porch carrying a banjo.

"Um … Mac …" Riley stammered.

"He's got a banjo," Jack said flatly.

"I've seen this movie!" Bozer squeaked. "I know how it ends! I die first!"

Riley couldn't disagree with his almost panic. "We need to get out of here."

"He can hear you," Mac pointed out. "Hi there … ahem … Sir," he called out somewhat nervously.

The man stroked the strings of the banjo. "You folks ain't from around here."

Bozer was mumbling about dueling banjos under his breath and Jack elbowed him quiet.

"No, sir," Mac said with another tentative step forward. "My friends and I are from Los Angeles. We're up here for the weekend. We're planning to hike out in Walker Gorge."

Riley hissed a warning about sharing their plan with strangers, Bozer has started to mumble about being the red shirt on a Star Trek away mission but was also still inserting phrases about _Deliverance_ , and under his breath, Jack was egging them both on.

Msc took another step toward the steps, offering to pay for the spot, even after the intimidating stranger tried to warn them off the trail. The man rose and took several heavy steps toward them. Mac dropped back a step, and heard all three of his companions do the same behind him.

Silence hung in the air for what felt like a year.

The man on the porch cracked a smile. The others could see Mac's shoulders shaking. Then his infectious laugh bumped out and he started up the steps, pulling the giant bear with the banjo who was now laughing too into a hug.

Jack started laughing and slapped Bozer and Riley on their backs. "Hey Freddy!"

"Hey Jack! Good to see you!" the man called back with a wave as he released Mac.

"How you doing, man?" Mac asked with a huge grin.

"Good! It's good to see you, Mac!"

"Good to see you, too, Freddy."

"Um … Mac?" Bozer started.

"Sorry, guys," he grinned. "This is Freddy. He owns the place."

"You'll have to forgive me," the man smiled warmly. "I've known Mac since he was a kid. Since he started being people up here on his own, we been having a little fun."

"Sure, fun," Riley mumbled.

"So these two a couple more newbies for the meat grinder?" Freddy asked Mac.

"This is Riley and Bozer, Freddy. And yeah, I'm going to take them up into the gorge for the weekend."

"And Jack's getting dragged along for the ride, huh? Didn't you punish him enough last time out?"

"Wait," Bozer interjected. "Jack had to come up here for training with you?"

"Nah, man," Jack said. "We come camping up here sometimes. Just to unplug a little, man. It's nice."

"Bullshit!" Mac coughed into the crook of his arm.

"You're admitting it's not nice up there, Mac? That's not like you," Freddy teased.

"More like I'm i incredible about what I think about it," Jack said, finally reaching the porch to shake Freddy's hand.

"Incredulous," Mac corrected absently. He handed Freddy the keys to his Jeep. "You sure it's not a bother?"

"Never is, Mac," he grinned. "You have fun out there, ya here."

Freddy turned to go back inside and Mac jogged down the steps, followed closely by Jack who was once again struck by how at ease Mac was right now, headed up the side of a mountain for days worth of what anyone else would deem punishment. At ease, but excited too. The kid couldn't wait.

"Alright, wallets, keys, phones, right here guys," he said, extending his hands to take their personal items. "That means you too, Jack."

Jack grinned and shook his head, handing Mac his wallet and keys. "You enjoy this way too much for it to be healthy, kid."

"Phone, too, Dalton," he smirked. "Matty said if you wanted to come you had to play along."

"I don't have it."

Mac frowned. "You came all the way up here without a phone?"

"Yeah … I … uh … I left it a Phoenix."

Mac's frown deepened. "What for?"

Jack's voice dropped, though Mac didn't think he realized it. "I've been getting weird texts from an unknown number. Matty's havin' the tech folks go over it. Figured I wouldn't need it up here anyway, cuz if I didn't just give it up you'd pick my pocket," he chuckled.

It sounded forced as hell and Mac cocked an eyebrow at him, but decided to let it go. "C'mon, you guys, too. I'm gonna go leave this stuff with Freddy. He's got a safe in there I can stash our stuff in."

Riley and Bozer both made an elaborate show of handing over their stuff. Mac ran it inside and Jack got out their backpacks.

Bozer took his and made a face. "Why are these things big enough to lug a body? There's nothing even in them …"

Mac rejoined them then. "There's rain gear, a canteen, and a knife. That's not nothing," he grinned. "Anything else we need, we'll pick up along the way."

Riley looked around. "I'd say goodbye to modern civilization, but I think we left that a while ago."

Jack laughed. "You like givin' that phone up about as much as you did when you were a teenager."

"Payback's a bitch old man. You just wait. Next time you're laid up, I'm gonna hide your Bruce Willis collection."

"Don't be mean to him, Ri," Bozer said earnestly. "He's the one we'll have to grill for answers when Mac just sits back on a log laughing at us."

"Mac wouldn't do that!" Riley defended.

"You didn't go to Scouts with him!"

"Alright, Alright," Mac said, blushing faintly. "Let's not start telling Scout stories."

Freddy had come back out onto the porch after securing Mac's keys and their other belongings. "You guys be safe out there," he called out to them. "Been a little flash flooding up here lately."

That got Mac's attention. "I didn't see that in the weather service reports. Anything coming in I might have missed?"

"Nah. Gonna be a bitch to find a dry place to sleep I bet, but other than that … nothing you don't already know about."

"Sounds good, Freddy," Mac said with a nod of thanks.

Freddy waved and they started across the parking lot toward the trail. Jack called back over his shoulder, "See ya in a couple days!"

"Don't be so sure!" he called back. Bozer and Riley both stopped and turned to look at him. "Not everyone who walks into those woods walks out." The twinkle in his eye belied the maniacal laugh, but neither of the inexperienced mountaineers thought it lessened the impact of the General ominous vibe one bit.

Mac and Jack, on the other hand, were both shaking with silent laughter as they led the way into the woods, laughing harder as the strains of Freddy's banjo followed them.

For a while, Bozer kept up complaining about the bugs, which Mac said he was imagining based on the cool weather, and the mud (which Mac had to concede was actually slowing them down a little), and the steep climb. Soon though, the fact that no one else, even Riley, was joining his complaints, combined with how out of breath he got trying to keep up with Mac, he gave up and focused on not falling behind.

Jack preferred the quiet to Bozer's bitching, but he kept an eye on the younger man. He and Mac did stuff like this for fun, and he knew Ri had at least a little experience roughing it from his days as her almost step-dad, but he'd never met an indoorsy-er guy than Wilt Bozer. And Bozer worked out, sure. You couldn't be an agent at Phoenix and not be in shape. But Jack had noticed Bozer's routine at the company gym was more focused on what he saw in the mirror than what it would help his body accomplish.

Once the silence from the back of the pack had gone on for several hours and all that could be heard was huffing and puffing from that direction, Jack slowed his own pace.

"You doin' alright there, Boze?" he asked, dropping back to the rear of their party to check on him.

"I … uh … 'm … fine," he puffed.

Riley laughed from her position next to Mac where she had tried to stay, continuing her earlier endeavor of getting as much information out of him as she could before he slipped out of instructor mode and into testing mode. "Told you you should start hitting the treadmill more before all this, Bozer! Your guide runs the Hollywood hills every morning for fun!"

Mac slowed down though, then stopped, concerned. "Am I pushing you guys too hard? Be honest. I want this to be a learning experience, not get anyone hurt, okay?"

Riley shrugged. She was still enjoying herself. She hadn't expected to, but she meant what she said about being away from a keyboard. This actually felt good. She could sort of understand why Mac did this all the time. "I'm alright. I mean, I'm tired, but I'm kinda looking forward to being able to sleep even though I know it's gonna be on the ground, so I figure it's probably a good thing."

Jack glanced at Bozer before he answered. "I'm not sayin' I need you to slow down or anything, but I'm also not sayin' I'd hate it."

Bozer's eyes broadcast his gratitude at not being left to be the only one wishing he was home. "I'm with Jack, Mac. I'll follow you right to the peak here even if I drop at the top, but … I'd like to be able to breath. Especially since we don't have much water on us."

Mac nodded, thinking. Bozer needed something to focus on other than the unpleasantness of the journey. In the Army Mac had always sort of liked calling cadences as a way to get his mind off a run or a march. Knowing class time was back on might help Bozer, since he wasn't about to suggest a rousing rendition of The Army Colors or Captain Jack, although he figured he had at least one teammate out here who would be down with it. "So, let's start thinking about our needs," he began.

Riley moved so she could see both his face and their surroundings well, because she recognized his teacher tone immediately. "We're really far out now, so … we need to know where we are," she said, remembering that orienting yourself was one of the most important things in an actual survival situation.

Mac grinned his approval and took them through determining direction and landmarks. He flushed faintly a few times at Jack's grinning approval. Jack was always saying if he ever got tired of the spy game, Mac should be a teacher. When Mac had rolled his eyes at the observation recently, Jack had said, "You just listen to yourself some time when you're trying to explain a thing to me or anybody else for that matter."

At first the observation had irritated him. Turning things into a lesson, using a teacher sort of persona, was something he associated with his f … With Oversight. He really didn't want to remind himself of the man if he could help it. He was trying to be okay with all of that, but his dreams lately, his unease with the work, were clear indicators that all was not well with house Phoenix, not for Mac and Oversight anyway. After he'd sat with it for a bit though, he realized that if he was going to be like James Macgyver at all, being someone who could teach something important just about anywhere, especially if that lesson kept his friends alive, wasn't the worst thing he could have inherited.

The rest and trying to absorb the lesson gave Bozer the wherewithal to start complaining again. This time it was about being hungry. Mac took almost perverse pleasure in introducing them to cattails. He and Jack kept looking at each other, trying not to laugh as Riley and Bozer chewed their way through their first few bites. Later, or maybe tomorrow after they got the feel for what it would be like to survive on truly lean rations and proved themselves capable of applying the tracking lessons he was integrating into the hike, he'd introduce them to the roots, to pine needles for seasoning, to finding eggs to cook them with. He'd discovered you could eat pretty well out here, if you knew what you were doing. But they'd have to earn it.

He and Jack crunched happily away on their own cattails, Mac because he really thought they were pretty good and was also sort of enjoying getting to put his friends through this little exercise, and Jack because he had no less than four Snickers and a couple of bags of beef jerky hidden in his coat for later.

Bozer grumbled some more about the wet cotton taste of the cattails and Mac just laughed. "Survivin' in the woods ain't easy," he said in an almost perfect parody of Jack.

"That's why no one comes out here!" Bozer asserted.

Mac started to laugh, but it morphed into an observation as his brain put together the things he was seeing in the clearing. "Actually, it looks like someone did," he said, picking up a scrap of fabric.

Jack squatted down for a better look at the ground, and picking up a wet cigarette butt with a nose wrinkle of disgust. "And they brought a lot of equipment with 'em," he observed, looking at the scratched up earth around a poorly tended fire pit.

Mac agreed. "But they pretty clearly have no idea how to use any of it." He grinned again. A bunch of amateur campers was a good opportunity to see if his pupils had been paying attention. "So … can you two tell me what mistakes they made." He flashed a grin at Jack. "No helping them, Old Man. I know you already know, so don't show off."

Jack chuckled, but rose to his feet, almost as curious as Mac as to how the others would do.

"They didn't ring their fire with stones." Riley walked around thoughtfully. "And they camped in a valley, which is a no-no with the flash flooding Freddy mentioned."

"Very good," Mac nodded.

"And they left cigarette butts all over, which isn't just a fire hazard that's set this coast on fire more times than we can count, but it violates the Leave No Trace Rule, too."

"Not to mention being extremely rude," Bozer chimed in, feeling the need to contribute something to the conversation.

"What else?" Jack prompted, seeing Mac still looking for more from them.

"Um … Nothing that I can see," RIley hedged, looking around again.

After a minute or two, Mac let them off the hook. "Cotton fibers. They are asking for trouble out here dressed in cotton. Can either of you tell me why?"

"Um … It's not a cold weather fiber?" Riley tried.

"Well, cold enters into it," Mac acknowledged. "But not so much because of the air temperature. You can layer enough of anything to stay warm temporarily. Cotton is death out here because it gets wet and stays wet. That'll lower your core temperature even on a warm day and this time of year puts you at risk for hypothermia the minute you get wet. And given the frequency of the rains here …"

"You never dry out, so you'll just get colder and colder," Riley finished for him, earning an approving smile from Mac and Jack both.

"And that's why we're dressed head to toe in nylon and that wool you keep bitching about, Boze."

"Well, it's itchy!" he defended.

"It's itchy," Jack mocked, laughing.

Mac shook his head. "Alright, you guys. We don't have all that much daylight left to us. Let's get out of this valley and start talking about sheltering for the night."

Jack took his cue from Mac and started back up the trail, patting Riley on the shoulder as she fell into step beside him. "You're a real pioneer woman out here, Ri."

She flashed him an almost shy smile. "I do remember one or two things you taught me, Jack," she said, glancing at him, then away. "I always told you I hated it, but … I kind of looked forward to those camping trips, you know."

Jack's face split into the hundred fine lines one of his big genuine smiles could crack it into. "Me too, kiddo."

She glanced back at Bozer and Mac. Mac was engaged in trying to get Bozer more on board with what they were doing and reviewing what they'd already gone over since he hadn't contributed much. Mac took this very seriously and definitely didn't want to think about Bozer in a situation where he needed these skills and didn't have them. She felt like they were busy enough that she could be a little vulnerable. "I'm glad you could come out here with us, Jack. It's … nice. Reminds me of some good times we had before …" she trailed off, not wanting to bring up something painful.

"Before I chickened out and bailed on you. It's okay, Ri. You can say it."

"I don't want to dwell on that anymore, Jack."

He slung an arm around her shoulders. "You can't get rid of me so easy anymore, Ri." She put an arm around him too, and they walked along like that for a few minutes. Jack's silence grew thoughtful, and he cleared his throat. "Believe me, if I'm ever out of your life again it's because you asked me to be or …"

"I would never ask, Jack."

He smiled at her. "Good. So the only reason would be if I had to be to protect you or …"

"Or anyone in your family," she finished for him, giving him an affectionate squeeze before letting him go.

By the time they got to a suitable campsite, even Mac was leg sore and ready for a break. He and Jack kicked back on some large rocks while Bozer and Riley struggled to build a shelter for a while. Finally, neither of them could stand it anymore and they stepped in for a demonstration of the correct technique. After that the shelter went up quickly and Mac set them to trying to start a fire.

It was getting dark and his two students were getting desperate. They were also giving him the sorts of dirty looks that said they thought he was enjoying this. To be honest, he had been at first, but now his feet were wet, he was tired, too, and he wanted a fire almost desperately. Based on how Jack was massaging his bad wrist, which Mac knew had some arthritis in it even if Jack wasn't ready to admit that, he knew his partner was ready to warm up, too. Time to offer a little wisdom that would both instruct these guys and get all of them warm sometime before they actually needed to be airlifted out of here like he'd joked about with them earlier.

"I once spent two full days trying to start a fire. I'm not kidding. 48 hours straight, two sunsets.  
But it was all soaked. I was convinced I was gonna freeze to death."

Jack frowned at him. "You've never told me that story."

"Was that during Phoenix survival training?" Riley asked, trying another frustrated strike of her flint and steel.

"Uh, no, this was a camping trip with my grandfather. He used to take me out here a lot after my mom died. He always used to say, all you need to survive the wilderness is what's up here and what's out there."

Riley and Bozer both looked ready to throw in the towel on this whole training mission. Mac took pity on them, not to mention Jack who looked on the verge of chattering teeth, and showed them fireweed. It was handy stuff to know about.

Once the fire was blazing, and imminent death by urushiol inhalation, they were more comfortable. Although, Mac was wishing he'd made them do a written test before coming out here, because he might have told Bozer he needed to study more before being included. Him almost burning poison oak when he was twelve and still learning was one thing. Bozer doing it, after weeks of supposedly studying the assigned reading was something else. He was a little worried Bozer might not pass this course.

 _Oh, well, nothing for it but to keep moving forward with the lesson plan_.

If he failed, Mac would just take Bozer out closer to home for a few weekend camping trips and bring him along more slowly. Mac unlaced his boots and took off his socks to dry them. Riley and Bozer looked at him like he was crazy, but Jack clamped his current cattail between his teeth and started doing the same thing. "Good idea, man."

"Are you out of your mind?" Riley asked.

"Wet feet are bad news," Mac began.

"Ask any soldier," Jack threw in. "You gotta take care of your feet."

"Because of hypothermia?" Bozer asked, trying harder to remember what he'd read over the last couple of weeks. Riley was kicking his ass as far as being good at this went, and he could sense Mac was a little frustrated with him, though his friend was doing an admirable job concealing it.

"Well, it can be a contributing factor, Boze," Mac said with a nod, acknowledging the effort. "But mostly … How did we get here?"

"Um … hiking … Oh, you mean like … On foot," Bozer said, grinning when he saw Mac's expression melt into one of clear approval.

"And how are we gonna get out?"

"On foot," Bozer said with more confidence than he'd had previously.

"Exactly. So we want to minimize the chance of blisters, scrapes that could lead to infection, all that sort of thing."

"Not to mention the pain those things cause," Jack added. "Sore feet slow you down. And if you're out on your own, on the run, or chasing somebody … Which, let's face it, is what you're out here training for …"

"We don't want anything to get in the way of us being on someone's tail, or us getting away," Bozer finished.

"Welcome to the class," Riley teased lightly.

Mac started to arrange his pack into a pillow and position himself for maximum exposure to the radiant heat of the fire. The others weren't ready for sleep yet, but Mac had plans to be up before them to set the challenge for the following day. From his position on his side, he said, "Go ahead and let them have a bite, Jack. I'll pretend it never happened," with a grin.

"I don't know what you're talking about, Mac," Jack said, almost sheepishly.

"Sure, you don't partner," Mac chuckled, but didn't bother opening his eyes. "There's not like ten granola bars hidden in your inside pockets right now, of course."

Mac grinned broadly when Jack whispered, "They're Snickers bars and I only brought four," to the others.

As long as Jack packed out the trash, Mac wasn't about to begrudge any of them something that felt like a reward after the long day they'd put in. He dozed off listening to their pleasant chatter, Jack offering some words of wisdom along with nibbles of chocolate and the others asking him questions it had felt too dumb to ask Mac along the trail.

As the darkness grew more complete, one by one, Jack, Riley, then Bozer all curled up in their own spots under their shelter, and fell into the deep sleep only an exhausting day in the mountain air seemed able to bring on.

None of them smelled the faint tinge of tobacco that wafted over their campsite from time to time. Nor did they feel the watchful, malevolent eyes on them. But both of those things were there, hints of the danger to come.


	2. Chapter 2

The barest hint of grey kissed the eastern sky when Mac peeled his eyes open. He quietly eased himself up to sitting and started stretching out the knots any body winds itself in when sleeping on the ground on a cold night.

The fire was mostly out, but the embers were enough to see by to get his socks and boots back on. He was going to go find some really good food to have ready for breakfast just to prove the forest could provide something past barely adequate even when all you could do was forage. Then he'd review tracking, give them a general direction and instructions to give him twenty minutes lead time. Their job would be to track him to their evening camp site. Jack had already agreed to stick with them and shepherd them along if they strayed so Mac was anticipating kind of a fun day. He was also anticipating that today would be the day he'd win the $200 that was up for grabs between him and Jack.

But first he needed to head into the woods for a minute or two. It was light enough now to heed the call of nature.

He was getting to his feet to do just that when a sleep-graveled voice demanded, "Where you going?"

"Where do you think?"

"Oh, 'kay," Jack mumbled sleepily.

Jack was tempted to fall back asleep. He was beat. And sore. He loved a good camping trip, always had, he even enjoyed Mac's more intense version of camping most of the time. But a night out on the ground in the cold made it just a little harder to convince himself that he had too many more years of this in front of him. Hot damn, but what he wouldn't give for a soft bed right about now.

He stretched and yawned and froze as he heard what sounded like a short, sharp cry from off in the direction Mac had gone. Jack was on his feet with his weapon drawn in less than no time, stiff joints and achy muscles forgotten in one fluid movement.

In the quiet of the early dawn, Jack could hear the sounds of a struggle. He swallowed hard, moving off in the direction of the sounds, taking in every nuance. It wasn't the sound of animals or even human and animal. It was an all too human sound, down to the puffing breath and someone's muffled attempts to yell.

Jack picked up his pace, still careful to move quietly.

After what felt like roughly a thousand miles but was probably less than fifty yards Jack got to the clearing a short distance from their campsite. His whole body went cold and still at the sight of an armed man trying subdue his partner, mostly through a firm choke hold that had Mac's eyes wide and his lips purpling already. He gun the man was pressing into a struggling Mac's ribs didn't make him feel any better either.

He stepped forward. "Let him go."

Mac's assailant stiffened. Mac used the opportunity to throw himself back hard, trying to headbutt or at least unbalance whoever was behind him. All he succeeded in doing with the first attempt was getting choked harder, but he renewed his struggles knowing that now Jack was here and the element of surprise was no longer his attacker's advantage.

Jack tried again. "I said let him go." Unfortunately that was the same moment another body hit him hard from the side. Jack and the new threat skidded across the rocky ground with the force of the attack and his gun flew from his hand as his wrist struck a rock. Pain blossomed and he thought he'd maybe just broken something. That didn't stop him from using the hand to form a fist and take a swing at the guy suddenly on top of him though.

Jack got to his feet taking in the new threat along with the man squeezing Mac's throat with enough force that now the kid's eyes were starting to roll back. Jack dodged his own attacker and threw himself at the man choking Mac.

He slipped on the muddy ground so he only got a hand on the guy's jacket before the one who'd jumped him was grappling with him again. Only now the bastard had a knife.

Mac saw the glitter of metal a split second before Jack barked a pained curse. Then he heard the sickening crack of a solid punch to the jaw l, followed by the sound of a big guy crumpling to the earth.

Mac's vision was narrowing down to a point in the dark and he knew he was about to lose consciousness. He tried once again to throw himself backward. This time his feet found purchase on a dry rock.

Both he and whoever jumped him went sprawling on the wet ground and the death grip on his neck was released. Mac gasped for air and started scrambling to get up, but a voice, not Jack and not the one who'd spoken from behind him just as he'd been about to head back toward camp said, "Move and you're both dead." He heard the distinct sound of a rifle being snugged into someone's shoulder, preparing to shoot.

Mac wanted to turn toward the voice but wisely he stayed still on the ground, raising his hands in the surrender. "Okay," he said, though he was barely audible, his voice hoarse from being nearly choked out.

"On your feet," the voice ordered. This time, instead of trying to talk, Mac just nodded and slowly got up.

In spite of Mac's newly declared surrender, his original attacker got to his own feet and strode over and hit in hard in the face. Still gasping for breath, it sent Mac back to the ground.

"Knock it off, Sid. We need this one awake."

"He ran his head into my nose!" the man complained.

"You'll live. Tie his hands."

Mac nearly forgot himself and started struggling when the man pulled a rope out of his coat, but the other man had picked Jack's gun up off the ground and checked the load. Now he leveled it at Jack's head, who Mac realized was on the ground and out cold. And bleeding from a wound in his side. He was muddy too so it was unclear just how badly he was injured. At least he was breathing.

Mac stilled, holding his hands out. Blood was trickling down his face and he could taste it too. He saw the other man's eyes flicker toward the direction of their camp. That was enough for him to reflexively start to rise, thinking only to warn them somehow. Memories of Riley and Bozer too damned close to The Ghost's bomb threatened to choke him just as surely as his attacker.

"Don't do it," the man warned. "So much as a peep and your buddy and those two still sleeping are done. You get me?"

Mac met his eyes and nodded once. Then he hazarded a very quiet, "You'll leave them alone if I cooperate?"

"Unless they make trouble."

"Okay."

He got to his feet when the man gestured, and fell into step between them, trying to keep his footing despite the sort of dizzy haze being choked and struck repeatedly had his brain in.

He was glad his hands were tied in front of him because it allowed him to occasionally break branches. He also stumbled from time to time, and only about every third one was unintentional. The tripping allowed him to conceal how he was dragging his boots. He hoped Jack was okay for a lot of reasons, but right now the biggest one was that as soon as his partner came to he'd be on their trail, and finding a way to get help.

Mac had had enough of being taken prisoner just in this last year to last a hundred lifetimes.

Bozer opened his eyes resentfully, grousing about his lovely food coma of a dream being interrupted. Then he got a look at Riley's face. "Where's Mac?"

"I don't know. No sign of him."

Bozer looked around a little frantically. "What about Jack?"

Riley shook her head. "He's gone too, but his boots are still by the fire pit."

"Well," Bozer hedged. "Day two is tracking … maybe we're gonna have to track Mac …"

"What about Jack's boots still being here?"

"Mac probably left him with us so we don't do anything stupid."

"Like try to burn poison oak?" she smirked.

"Yeah, like that." He thought for a moment. "Jack probably had like an emergency bathroom situation or something. If we pick up Mac's trail before he gets back that oughta be worth some points, right?"

They both got to their feet and started ranging around the campsite, looking for clues as to where Mac had gone to. Riley got lucky first. "I got some bootprints over here."

Bozer came over quickly. "Let's see." He inspected them carefully. "These aren't Mac's. Look at the sole."

"It's a different shoe," she agreed "And it wasn't here when we made camp."

Bozer found what they'd been looking for. "These are Mac's footprints."

Riley shivered. "So someone else was here?" She paused and bent down, lifting a cigarette butt and holding it up for Bozer to see. "This is the same brand we saw at that campsite yesterday. And it's got dew all over it, which means whoever dropped it must have been here last night."

Bozer's eyes were wide and round. "So that smoker was watching us while we were sleeping, and now Mac's suddenly vanished?"

"Not to quote Jack … but I'm getting a really bad feeling about this."

"Jack!" Bozer shouted. "Mac!"

Riley joined in. "Mac! Jack! Where are you?"

They headed in the direction of the boot prints, still calling out to both their teammates. It was only a low groan that kept Riley from tripping over Jack as he pushed himself up to sitting from his position on his back on the damp earth. "Ah," he mumbled, putting one hand to his head and wrapping the other arm around his middle.

"Jack!" they both exclaimed at once and dropped down onto the ground to help.

"Jack? Where's Mac?" Boze asked at the same time Riley asked, "Are you okay?"

Jack answered the more pressing of the two questions. "Two guys jumped us." He gasped as he tried to get up. "Must've taken Mac with them." He redoubled his efforts to get to his feet.

"You're bleeding," Riley observed, not that she expected him to stop getting to his feet but more because she felt it needed saying.

Jack paused, feeling around in various pockets, nodding his head. "Yeah … one of them had a knife."

"I … um … I read about how to make styptic powder in the guidebook, but I can't remember!" Riley chastised herself.

"S'alright," Jack assured her. "You just gotta ask yourself, WWMD?"

"Huh?" Bozer asked incredulously.

Riley grinned a little in spite of herself. "What would MacGyver do? I thought that's what I was doing."

Jack pulled a small tube out of the inside of his coat. "And that wasn't a half bad idea, kiddo. But a little superglue can go a long way in situations like this. Never leave home without it."

She look the glue from him, shaking her head. "Sit for a minute. Let's take a look at how bad …"

Jack didn't sit, but he leaned against the nearest tree, tugging his bloody and torn T-shirt up. A cut ran from his belly button all the way to the waistband of his jeans by his hip, but despite all the stinging and bleeding, it was pretty shallow. It wasn't deep enough to have damaged anything vital anyway. He sucked in his breath sharply when Riley applied the glue but after a couple of minutes the bleeding was stopped and the wound was almost numb from the glue.

Bozer had taken the opportunity to look around. "Looks like they headed this way," he pointed. "I've got Mac's tracks, plus two others. Same boots but different sizes so it looks like there was only the two you saw, Jack."

Jack nodded his approval, limping over to where Bozer was looking. Now that he was up on his feet, he realized he'd twisted something in his left ankle painfully. But the upside seemed to be that while his wrist hurt like hell, he was pretty sure it wasn't broken like he'd first thought. "Nice work, Boze. Let's go,"

"Um … Jack … I know how focused you get when you're worried about Mac, but do you think you maybe want your boots?" Riley asked.

"And your pack?" Bozer agreed.

Jack frowned. He'd lost sight of the fact that his feet were bare. "Yeah, I guess I do."

"Be right back!" Riley called, already taking off at a run to get Jack's gear.

As soon as she got back, she helped Jack get his boots on so he wouldn't have to keep bending right at the site of that knife wound. Bozer shouldered Jack's pack. "I got this, man."

"Thanks, Boze. Thanks, Ri. Now let's go get Mac back."

They headed into the woods in the direction the boot prints pointed. After only a few steps, Jack noticed a broken branch, and then another no far beyond that. Then another. He half smiled to himself. That kid was always thinkin'.

Thunder rumbled again and a few damp sprinkles found their way down through the trees and onto the small group trudging through the woods. Mac's head was pounding now; exertion after a blow to the head (or face) wasn't exactly ideal.

He stumbled again, this one definitely not on purpose and the man in front, who he's gleaned went by the name Gio, grabbed him by the collar and hauled him upright again. "Knock it off!" he barked.

"Sorry," Mac breathed. "Sorry."

Gio sent the other man ahead to let "the crew" know they were going to be moving out. Mac found himself seized by the elbow and the barrel of Jack's pistol jammed between his shoulder blades. "Keep moving!" A shove almost sent Mac sprawling but he kept his feet and made them move in the direction the other man had gone. He glanced up at the ominous sky wondering when it was just going to open and drench them. He actually wouldn't mind. He was thirsty as hell and would have considered giving up a kidney to get enough water to wash the blood out of his mouth.

Mac felt like he struggled up the next mud-slick hill for about an hour. It was almost a relief when he was shoved again and found himself on a spot where the ground was leveled out and a small group of pale, miserable looking, hard faced people who were pretty clearly the "crew" mentioned earlier.

"Fellas," Gio said with a menacing grin. "Meet our new guide."

Hands on him, grabbing his pack. He tensed, then forced himself to try to relax again, to assess the situation. The girl had his canteen and was drinking greedily from it. "You might want to ration that," he said conversationally. When all it got him was punched in the gut again, he coughed and blinked a few times, but doubled down on what he'd started to say. "Clean water is hard to come by out here."

All that earned him was a dirty look, but when he revealed that he didn't carry food with him he knew he was about one breath away from getting the living hell beat out of him. When they were distracted by getting their meager gear together, Mac eyed a possible escape route. It was a steep bank, probably a dangerous drop if he went over it wrong. But he thought he could control his descent enough to get to the bottom in one piece. If he could do that, he could probably get ahead of these guys enough to lose them since, just as he'd pointed out to them, these guys weren't exactly experienced hikers.

"Only gonna say this once, Ranger Rick," came Gio's cold voice, stopping him from making an attempt. "Don't." Mac's eyes flicked to his face. "All my friends run faster than you."

Mac sighed. This guy didn't miss much. "So, are you gonna tell me what this is all about? Where do you need to go so badly you're willing to kidnap a guide?"

He passed Mac a creased and damp piece of paper with a rough map drawn on it. "X" marks the spot."

"What's at the "X"?" Mac asked, looking it over.

"Not your concern," Gio bit out with icy menace. "Just get me there."

"Okay," Mac sighed heavily. "But … I don't really know how to tell you this. This is on the other side of some of the roughest terrain out here." The criminal's expression hardened more, but Mac kept going. "A trek like this should only be attempted by a well-trained crew, not a bunch of first-timers."

In a brief but damaging fit of rage, Gio struck out with the butt of his rifle, landing it solidly in Mac's ribs. Mac doubled over, gasping for breath again. "I didn't ask your opinion.  
Just get us there, all right?"

Mac swallowed hard a couple of times, having a stern talk with his stomach that it was not allowed to refund his meager breakfast of cattails on this guy's shoes no matter how much it wanted to. When he caught his breath, he tried again. "Getting angry doesn't change the fact that you have no food, no water.  
You're inexperienced, and you're not prepared for this hike. I mean, it's about to rain and …"

He was cut off by another blow to mid midsection. Gio leveled the gun at him. "Maybe I'm not making myself clear.  
Act as if your life depends on getting us to that X. Because it does."

Mac's eyes squeezed shut and this time he dropped down on the ground to catch his breath. Rain started to fall softly. He felt it patter, cold and foreboding against his overheated neck. He hoped the others had been able to follow the trail signs and come to find him. He needed back up. And fast.

 _C'mon, guys. Hurry._

Gio didn't wait for him to be breathing normally to haul him to his feet and shove him in the direction of the X on the map.

 _I've got a bad feeling about this._


	3. Chapter 3

Mac was freezing. It was a chilling drizzly damp that got into your bones. Every bruise from the beating he'd taken ached and he was pretty sure, not positive but willing to concede the possibility, that if the devil himself showed up and offered him a couple of aspirin and a hot coffee he'd probably cheerfully exchange it for his soul.

Out of the corner of his eye, he saw the woman, Emma, shiver. The tall skinny guy, Sid, had been fighting chattering teeth or a while. While Mac didn't especially want to say anything, since every time he'd opened his mouth it seemed like Gio or Anton decided it made him an attractive piñata substitute. But if he didn't say anything and things got dire and they panicked, that would probably be worse. He sighed quietly. "You know, we should really stop and build a fire to dry those clothes out before you all become hypothermic."

Unsurprisingly, Gio gave him another shove and snapped, "Just keep moving."

Mac shook his head but kept his mouth shut and trudged on. He already hurt all over and the really challenging terrain was in front of them. He didn't think he could mentally face another asskicking and still get them over what was ahead. And not being able to help them was as good as pulling the trigger himself. He had to give his team time to get help.

He cringed inwardly when they reached a tall unstable looking rock fall. He eyed it dubiously, then reached out to touch the rocks, almost flinching when he found exactly what he expected. "What's the hold up," Gio snapped.

Mac explained the problem with the ice on the rocks like he expected the group, and their leader to be reasonable. Given the looks of trepidation on most of their faces, he had a split second of hope that they weren't going to bull ahead and do the stupid thing. Then When he suggested using another route (which would cause them to have to double back and hopefully put them closer to wherever his team was) Gio demanded, "Will that take longer?"

Mac glanced away, almost anticipating another beating just for stating the obvious. "Well, yeah … a little."

He couldn't hide his frustration at their determination to do things the wrong way, the dangerous way, out here. Amateurs who thought they knew better than their guidebooks or, worse, their guides got people hurt, sometimes killed. More than once Mac had been a search and rescue volunteer in the mountains around Los Angeles and more often than not the emergency was caused by somebody trying to cowboy their way through something they didn't have the knowledge or skill for.

He did his best to tamp downnon his flash of temper before he said something that would make Gio decide he was more trouble than he was worth. He just bit down on what he wanted to say and asked for what he needed to assemble some makeshift crampons for the group to at least try to get them over the rocks.

He'd been grateful for his gloves as they'd marched along, but between those and the fact that they wouldn't untie his wrists, construction was a frustrating process. He hoped his imposed lack of dexterity didn't create any fatal flaws in their improvised gear.

Finally in frustration at watching him, Giovanni cut his hands free. He was so relieved to just be able to work toward some semblance of safety, he knew it was written all over his face. Gio took it as another flash of escape plotting and shoved him up against the rocks, hard. "No games, kid, or you are not makin' it out of here. You get me?"

Mac's eyes got a cold look. One that told the crook he was more than some kid off for a weird family getaway in the mountains. "I know I'm not playing any. If you could take this as seriously as whatever it is under that X, we might just make it there alive."

It resulted in another shove, but just one aimed at setting him back to work. That he could deal with. After he made sure they had the traction devices secured to their shoes, Mac was explicit about them needing to follow him. As far as bouldering went, this wasn't a particularly challenging climb for someone with experience, even with the complication of the ice. For these guys it was easy to see how it could turn deadly.

When Sid fell, it didn't even surprise him. Annoy, sure. But not surprise. Somebody not listening on a hike was pretty much what he was used to from taking student groups out for Phoenix community outreach projects. The difference was he never took those kids anywhere dangerous, and help was always just a phone call away.

Gio refused to stop the party so Mac could really do something about the bad sprain (and probably break, which Mac kept to himself because he didn't feel like picking any teeth up off the ground). Mac practically stomped off into the woods without the leader's permission to implement his back up plan of making a splint and a crutch.

Thoughts of a not too long ago helicopter crash, and injured pilot and an injured Jack flitted through his head. Even mostly one handed, Mac would have given about anything for his partner to be with him now. Then the gnawing worry that Jack had been hurt worse than he appeared clawed its way back up to the forefront of his thoughts. _That's not helping,_ he growled at his brain.

He finished gathering what he needed, ignoring the other members of the group who'd followed him and headed back toward the injured man. A gunshot rang out and he flinched sort of instinctively. He knew what he was going to find well before he came out of the trees and saw Gio standing over a bloodied body.

Jack stumbled for about the fifth time in as many minutes. The pull on the cut across his stomach made him suck in his breath. Riley was on his elbow, holding his arm, before he'd even finished bending double with the pain of it. "Hey, maybe we should sit for a minute?"

Jack grimaced as he forced himself upright again. He could feel the wound seeping again. It was clearly not as shallow as his occasionally overly optimistic brain had wanted it to be when Riley helped him glue it. "Pretty sure those guys aren't lettin' Mac sit. So we can't afford to either."

Riley's disapproving little head shake and eyeroll was the vision of her mother and Jack told her so with all his affection for both of them in his voice. "It never got her anywhere with me either, honey," he said with a slight chuckle. "You can holler at me all the way to the nearest emergency room when we get off this mountain. But I'm here to tell you the only way I'm climbing off it at all is when we get Mac back."

"I'm with him Ri," Bozer said, catching up to them. "Jack's already told us these guys looked armed and desperate."

"We got any glue left, Ri?" Jack asked.

"A little," she hedged.

This time Jack took it and dealt with the weeping wound himself. Unfortunately this "treatment" emptied the bottle. He leaned against a nearby boulder, waiting for it to dry a little, hoping that would make a difference in keeping the cut closed this time.

"At least we know Mac was more or less okay when they passed through here. He's still leaving all kinds of sign, even if one of those assholes wasn't throwing cigarette butts all over," he said, hoping to assuage at least a little of the younger team members' concern. He was worried sick, too, but he'd learned you couldn't count Mac out even when things were dire. The guy had swam almost all the way to shore with a bullet in his chest at Lake Como. He'd gotten himself back from Murdoc, hell, more than once. He'd … Well, worked miracles. Often. And Jack couldn't help him the way the kid deserved if these guys got panicky or hopeless.

Bozer surprised him by picking right up on his forward thinking vibe. "And they can't be all that far ahead of us. It's raining some but these tracks are still pretty crisp," he said, pointing.

Jack grinned and slapped him on the shoulder. "Good eye, kid."

Bozer absolutely beamed. It made Riley smile, too. Getting called 'kid' was high praise coming out of Jack, since he usually reserved the word for Mac. Riley knee Jack loved her like a daughter, and he liked Boze, trusted him as a teammate. But Mac was different. There was some of that brothers in arms stuff she'd observed in other people who'd served together, some just long-standing friendship and familiarity, occasionally even the same protective parental feeling she got from Jack, too. But it was more complicated even than that.

She didn't know how to describe it really, but … Jack saw Mac as a friend, a colleague, a brother, sometimes even as his kid. And he took the idea of being Mac's Overwatch like a literal Wookie life debt. But … she thought she maybe landed in the difference in Jack's relationship with Mac from all the others in his life. She'd even been a little jealous of their relationship a few times.

Jack respected Angus MacGyver in a truly unique way.

He thought enough of Mac to let him be completely himself, even when that individuality pained Jack personally. And Jack knew Mac felt the same way. Jack has been the only one Mac said goodbye to in person when he'd left for Nigeria. That was … special.

She found herself giving Jack a one armed hug. He hugged back but gave her a funny raised eyebrow look. She decided not to try to argue him into resting or anything else that might slow them down. "You lean on me if you need to, old man," she said, forcing her lips into a teasing grin. "Let's go get …"

A gunshot in the distance stopped her cold.

They all looked wildly at each other for a second.

"Mac!"

All three Phoenix agents broke into a run.


	4. Chapter 4

Mac couldn't stop himself from demanding that Giovanni explain or somehow justify his actions. Part of it was wanting to see if Gio was on enough of an emotional edge to be wrongfooted by a little pushing. Another part of him was just genuinely incredulous that the man was so stone cold and dedicated to his purpose that he'd kill another human being like a cowboy putting down a lame horse in the cheesy western movies his grandfather used to favor on Sunday afternoons.

Mac's expression of stark horror was replaced by one of careful disdain in a blink. "Well, my friends will have heard that shot …" _Sound is like a neon sign out here, dumbass,_ was heavily implied.

Gio gestured with his gun, unmoved by either Mac's indignation or his seemingly veiled threat that people were coming for him. Gio had shot Sid. He wouldn't think twice about shooting anyone who followed them. "If you wanna keep them out of this, I suggest you pick up the pace."

Anton reinforced the boss's message by giving Mac a light kick behind his knee. His jaw clenched because his hands were free now and he really wanted to just pounce of the guy and start beating the hell out of him, but he knew it wouldn't be smart.

He just shook his head and started leading the way once again toward that distant, coveted X, going as slowly as he could get away with by playing up his injuries from the repeated beatings he'd received since early that morning.

After what felt like forever, Mac put up a hand to stop them. He actually needed a minute to catch his breath, and he wanted a calm eye to eye moment with Gio to point out the obvious and hopefully not get his ass handed to him again.

"How much further?" Gio demanded.

"About two miles, give or take." He didn't point out that it was going to be over some of the steepest roughest terrain yet. Nor did he point out that the temperature was dropping. He swallowed and then did point out his most pressing concern. "That's gonna be a one way trip if we don't stop and collect some water."

Gio blew him off. "When we get there."

Mac shook his head stubbornly. This dumbass really wasn't getting it. "If our muscles cramp from dehydration, you gonna shoot everybody?" he damanded, and wished almost immediately that he hadn't because the look Gio gave him said, 'You bet your ass I will.' Then his expression relaxed a little, like he was curious what Mac was going to do or say next. His curiosity didn't encourage him to lower his weapon though. Mac didn't even offer to go with the group down to the nearby stream, just asked for the stuff he needed to build a crude filtration system.

Gio assigned Emma to help Mac process the water and keep an eye on him. She kept throwing frowning little glances at the boss. Mac thought maybe, based on all the little tells in her posture, face, and voice, that she was ready to flip on Gio. Since they were getting close to their destination, his team hadn't caught up with them yet, and he had no illusions about what was going to happen to him the second they had their hands on their prize, Mac ventured an offhand sounding comment about Emma's place in Gio's plans, implying that she was at least as disposable, and probably more so, as Sid.

All it got him was threatened, smacked again, and a promise of punishment in his future. But at least a few things were clearer. For one thing, he could get away with a little and not get his head blown off. They still needed him too badly. And for another, Gio's crew was loyal to him, above anything else, even their own survival.

How useful that information was remained to be seen, but he filed it away liked any piece of potentially useful data. Then he got stiffly to his feet, and started leading the way on the last leg of the journey, hoping this wasn't going to be a one way trip.

0-0-0

Riley's voice shook just a bit when she called out, "Hey! I've got more blood over here."

Jack limped over looking pale and wan and … Riley didn't want to name what else she saw on his face, but her brain did it anyway. Afraid. Jack was afraid. And it made her cold all over in a way that days out in the wintery wet here couldn't even touch.

Bozer scrambled over the rocky ridge first, his aptitude for rock climbing becoming more apparent as they followed Mac's clues. "It's not him!" he all but shouted over his shoulder. "It's not Mac!"

Jack was struggling up the rocks, and Riley had slung an arm around him to offer support, so she felt him almost slump with relief. When they got to the top and looked over the ledge, Jack frowned. "That's one of the guys who jumped us."

Bozer swallowed hard. "If they're shooting their own … it's only a matter of time before …"

"That's not gonna happen," Jack interrupted sharply. He frowned. "We gotta slow down here a second and make a plan though. They took my gun and were are miles from real help, probably a day out from anything the way we came. I really wish you'd done your old disassembled phone trick, Riley, I'm not gonna lie," Jack sighed, running both hands over his head in a nervous, frustrated gesture.

"Me, too," she agreed. Then she leaned forward, squinting at the body below them. "Hey, that guy still has his radio on him."

Jack leaned forward to look, too. "Yeah. Yeah, he does."

"What good does that do us?" Bozer snapped. "We got a big fat fifty foot problem between us and that radio. Besides what're we gonna use some crook's radio for?"

"If we can get it, I think I can contact a park ranger."

"What good will that do? We're too far from the ranger station to do any good," Bozer protested. "We can't keep wasting time getting to Mac!"

Jack noticed Bozer looking a little wild around the eyes. Hungry, thirsty, and exhausted, worry about his best friend combined to keep Bozer from thinking clearly. "For starters Boze, they'll have a phone and can call Phoenix for us."

"Not to mention ATVs and all kinds of search and rescue stuff," Riley added.

"Good point," Bozer concedes sheepishly. "I'm just anxious to get to our boy before," he looked over the ledge at the broken body below. "Before that."

Jack patted him on the shoulder. "Me too, Boze." Then Jack sighed. This was going to suck. "Alright," he stripped off his backpack at coat. "One a you hold this stuff."

Riley knee what he was thinking, but her brain didn't quite want to believe it. "What for?" She asked, her eyes going wide.

Jack shrugged, wincing as the simple movement pulled across his midsection. "Gonna climb down and get us a radio, Ri."

"Jack, you can't do that. You're injured."

Bozer added, "And it's a straight drop!"

Jack looked over the edge again. "You both have good points, but we need that damned radio."

Riley chewed her lip. "You think there enough stuff around here to make a rope?"

Bozer's usual skeptical eyebrow went up. "You seriously think one of those sorry-ass Mac ropes is gonna hold a full size Jack Dalton? Those things used to barely hold action figures!"

Riley actually grinned. "I think there's maybe a difference between the stuff Mac made as a kid and what he showed us how to make as part of this course."

She was already moving around, gathering materials. Bozer's eyebrow hadn't lowered. "I guess but …"

"And we're not gonna use it for one of us."

Jack's face split into a grin. "We goin' fishin'?"

She grinned in return. "Just like the old days."

"Oh!" Boze said, finally grinning too in fresh realization. "You're making a line with a hook! That makes way more sense."

The whole team got to work on the finishing line, hoping that radio would be what they, a Mac, desperately needed.

A life line.


	5. Chapter 5

Mac looked around a little wildly, wishing he wasn't so certain of his map skills as Gio's glare cut into him. "I … um … Yeah, we're, um, we're here."

"Spread out. Find it!" the boss snapped, keeping a careful eye on Mac.

"Gio, there's nothing here!" Emma called.

Gio shoved Mac and nearly sent him sprawling. "You led us to the wrong place!" He cracked Mac in the ribs with the butt of his gun for what felt like roughly the seven thousandth time.

He gasped for breath, bent over, resting his palms on his thighs. He forced himself to look up at Giovanni. "I did not." He swallowed against the strong desire to just throw up from the combination of being hit in the middle repeatedly as well as the fear-fueled adrenaline that was telling him he was a whisker away from death by this murderer's hand. "Look," he panted, gathering his thoughts, developing a plan to stay alive, and wishing his team was already here, hopefully with half of Phoenix and every park ranger between here and the Canadian border. "The geographical location this is ex …"

Giovanni struck him again. This time Mac went down in one knee, but forced himself back to his feet quickly, thinking fast. "Yeah, yeah," Gio said aggressively. "Either you screwed up, or you're playing games."

"I didn't," Mac insisted. "And I'm not."

"I don't believe you." Another blow nearly had Mac on the ground, and Gio was clearly prepared to keep up the beating. If he didn't put a stop to it now, Mac was pretty sure that's how he was going to die, beaten to death by an unhinged criminal.

"Wait," he gasped, holding his hands up in a placating gesture. "Wait." He frowned trying to get his brain rolling in the right direction again. "Is what you're looking for nailed to the ground?"

"What kind of question is that?"

The tone said it was time to really talk fast. "'Cause if it wasn't, it's possible that a flash flood took it away."

"Explain," Gio barked.

Mac pointed, flinching just a little when he moved his arm. _Oh, good, those ribs are definitely cracked … But you're still alive dumbass, so quit your bitching and keep this guy on the hook, Angus. "_ See the dried mud on the rocks right there. It's a waterline, and it's a recent one. If you tell me the size and the weight of what you're looking for, I may be able to determine …" Apparently he wasn't talking fast enough because Gio hit him again and he never even saw it coming. He pretended like it never happened and just pushed on. "where the flood took it."

Looking a little impressed at Mac's stoicism, Gio looked at him levely. "I'm looking for $18 million." Once Mac started to tease out that there was a 400 pound crate of cash out here, he thought he might be able to do something about it. He might not be able to find it, but he could at least buy himself some time. Gio pulled back like he might hit him again and demanded, Now, where is my money? Getting pretty sick of asking you."

 _Getting pretty sick of you trying to beat the answer out of me. Bad enough when somebody does it and I actually know it, you son of … I know, I know, if I say any of that out loud more beating is the best case scenario. Keep him talking, keep him looking for his payday and I might just make it out of here alive._

"Okay, look, I can I can use the erosion rate of the soil to determine the speed of the flash flood's water. Then I can solve for direction and distance traveled by the crate, as long as I can figure out the missing variable here."And that is? It's the, uh, angle of the slope of the ground we're standing on right now."

After a little more back and forth that fortunately didn't result in Gio or any of the other members of the gang whaling on him any more, he built a rudimentary surveying theodolite. He thought the eighteen degree angle measurement was pretty accurate, and he was fairly confident in his estimate of the rate of erosion and water speed based on what he'd learned from Freddie and from the National Weather Service.

"So if I can calculate the flood time and water speed using the erosion rate …" he said, half to himself, half to buy a little more time for the necessary mathematical gymnastics that were tough to complete in your head fully hydrated with a full stomach and not hurting all over. Gio's face said he'd gotten all the time he was going to get though. "... That means the crate would've floated about right there." He pointed again.

Gio gave him a hard look. "You better be right."

The group started fanning out to search the new location. Mac watched them warily, hoping almost desperately that he might see Jack, Boze, or Riley peering back at him out of the tree line.

0-0-0

When Riley finally got the radio tuned to a federal bandwidth she was searching for and they heard the crackle ofan incoming transmission, the group experienced a small moment of elation. As Riley spoke to the voice on the other end, Jack's face creased into a hundred lines of worry.

"Alright!" Bozer enthused. Help is on the way!"

"Finally!" Riley agreed. Then she frowned at Jack. "What is it, Jack?"

Jack gnawed on the inside of his cheek for almost a full minute. "That guy sound like any fed you've ever talked to?"

Her frown deepened. "Well … no … but he's a park ranger. That's different, right?"

Jack stuffed his hands in his pockets in an effort to not just start gesticulating wildly. He wanted them on the same page, not ramped up or freaked out. "Yeah, it's some different. But fish and wildlife folks, are still law enforcement. There's … I don't know how to describe it."

Bozer was nodding now. "Our neighbor back home was a game warden. He definitely always seemed like a policeman to me."

"So what do we do?" Riley asked, all her plans to sit tight and build a signal fire flying out the window. If Jack didn't accept the voice on the radio as one of the good guys, it would be crazy for them to argue. Mac might like to tease him about his 'spidey senses', but nobody on the team, including Mac, actually thought they were a joke. Jack's threat assessments were usually spot on enough to be a little spooky.

Jack scratched at the wound beneath his bloodied T-shirt, earning himself a glare from Riley. He stopped with a sheepish grin. "We get a move on. And we keep an eye out for 'em. I'll take point." He revised his vocabulary to be a little less militaristic when they didn't immediately seem to get the picture. "I'll range ahead, try to make sure we're in the clear. If we can avoid them and spot Mac first, we can probably get the drop on them."

Riley gave a curt nod. "Let's move out."

0-0-0

Mac's blood ran cold when he heard Riley's voice coming out of the radio. Partly because Gio and Emma both had their guns trained on him to keep him quiet, partly because it sounded like this crew was going to be able to trick them into a deadly situation.

There was also a big part of him that was worried that the voice wasn't Jack's. There was just no way Jack wasn't taking the lead out here. Knowing his partner was with the less experienced members of the team was mostly why he wasn't losing his mind with worry. His mind started throwing all kinds of scenarios at him in which Jack had struck his head during the fight, or the knife wound was more severe than Jack's reaction indicated, scenarios that had him both without a partner, and counting on two complete newbies to try to rescue him out here.

When Giovanni sent Anton after them, Mac nearly tried to bolt again. If Jack wasn't with them, they were screwed. He stopped himself though, telling himself to give them some credit. They'd gotten their hands on a radio, and while Ri sounded stressed, she didn't sound panicked. They were both fully trained operatives. Granted their specialties were a little less field oriented than his, so were most operatives. Even on his most self-effacing day, Mac had to admit his skill set was unique.

He walked in front of Gio as slowly as he thought he could get away with it in the likely direction of the crate of cash. When Anton radio'd them to say he nabbed two people, and described them, Mac's breathing picked up again. _No, Jack._ That was bad. _Really bad._

He couldn't count on them to mount a rescue. They were just too green at this stuff. He was going to have to figure out a way to save all three of them. He swallowed past the lump constricting his throat. _Four._

 _Never leave a man behind._


	6. Chapter 6

The looks of suspicion the entire group kept giving him had Mac keeping up a steady stream of explanatory chatter. Bozer often said he was always prone to over explaining himself when he was nervous or afraid and Mac just rolled his eyes. Now he realized it was maybe a little true.

As they followed the path of the recent flood waters, Mac kept talking. He also started formulating a plan. _Three bad guys, plus one who was on his way back with prisoners._ Only two prisoners, his mind whispered insidiously, setting off another cascade of worry for his partner. _Okay, if I can keep them talking long enough for Anton to get back with Ri and Bozer, and I can provide a diversion, the three of us should be able to neutralize the group and, if not secure them, at least get away and get local law enforcement involved. The question is how to do that._

He was distracted from hatching any kind of plot, escape or otherwise, by having to guide the group down a very steep ravine. It was so steep in fact that it felt like active rock climbing in places. Mac could feel his heart hammering in his chest, his sore ribs making him acutely aware of it in the most unpleasant way possible, with every sensation of real height.

 _Sooo, Mac, remind me why you do this for fun?_

 _Very funny, brain. Hilarious even._

 _My grandfather was a big believer in facing your fears. He started taking me rock climbing after the first time I freaked out on a ladder helping him paint the trim on the house. He said I might not ever stop being afraid, but that eventually that fear wouldn't stop me from doing what needed to be done. He also liked to quote Winston Churchill. "If you're going through Hell, keep going." That's it. One foot in front of the other until you're out the other side._

When they safely got to the bottom, Mac looked around to orient himself. He almost smiled when he realized the path the crate had taken with the flood waters brought them down and around the gorge, almost circling back to the trailhead. Well, not exactly. It was still miles away, but they were a lot closer to help than they had been when Gio jumped him by their original campsite.

This would be a good place to make a stand.

He was getting glared at again, so he took back up his stream of justifying his thought process around locating their loot to the increasingly ragged and disgruntled group.

"This ravine acts as a natural drainage basin for anything displaced by the flood. So your crate should be here."

The group started looking around.

Trevor, who Mac thought of as the quiet crook, pointed, "There."

Emma practically ran over the cold muddy ground. "There!" She and Trevor tore into the crate. She crowed, "It's all here."

Gio laughed his relief. "Yeah, well, we can celebrate when we get the money back to the car."

Trevor frowned, looking at the crate skeptically. "It'll be tough. We only have three backpacks, and we're a man down."

Emma shrugged and grinned. "On the bright side, 18 million split four ways is much better."

Gio shifted, his shoulders tensing. Sensing they had reached a critical moment, Mac tried his opening volley in the war of getting these guys distracted. Besides, he was almost sick with worry that Anton hadn't radio'd them again. They'd sent an inexperienced thug to collect to inexperienced mountaineers. It had been challenging to get here with him as a guide. "Okay," he said, his voice tight. "I did what you asked. I got you to your money. Now call your man and tell him to let my friends go."

Gio raised an eyebrow and gave Mac an appraising look. "If I said I was gonna kill your friends if you didn't think of a way to get all this money back, by yourself, what would you say?"

Mac's jaw tightened and his gaze hardened. "I'd say that wasn't part of the deal."

Giovanni's expression was grim, determined. "Yeah, well, I'm making it the deal."

Mac's jaw clenched and unclenched. He wasn't in a position to make a move and even if he was he sure as Hell couldn't do it if Anton had Riley and Bozer as bargaining chips.

After several long beats of silence, Gio barked, "Answer me." When Mac didn't immediately respond, he grabbed him by the front of his coat and Neely jerked him off his feet, driving the barrel of his gun into Mac's side. He demanded through clenched teeth, his voice dripping menace. "Can you build something to make moving my money a one-man job?"

Mac managed a defiant glare in return. "Sure?" he said with a little hesitation. Then he nodded. "Yeah."

Without expression or emotion, Gio punched him hard in the stomach and shoved him away. As Mac doubled over coughing and trying not to lose what little was in his stomach, Gio squeezed off two shots, and the remaining members of his crew dropped to the ground, dead before they finished falling.

Mac coughed again, but forced himself upright, demanding, "Why?"

"All right." Gio nodded with seeming satisfaction, once again leveling his weapon at Mac. "Do it, then."

"You're shivering," Mac observed.

"So?"

"This is gonna take a while. We should build a fire so you can dry off and warm up before we pack this out of here. It's going to be slow going."

"Fine," Gio tilted his chin at the brush and branches all around them. "Do that. Then get a move on. We'll move it all as soon as you're ready."

Seeing only one way out of this, Mac got to work.

0-0-0

Not too far off, the gunshots stopped Bozer and Riley cold. They were marching ahead of Anton at a brisk pace when they froze.

"Get a move on," he barked at them, as though those gunshots couldn't possibly be a matter of concern for any of them.

They trudged a little further in the misting damp before Bozer couldn't keep his thoughts to himself. "Where the hell is Jack?" he hissed in worried frustration.

"Up ahead somewhere." She glanced back over her shoulder.

"I know _that!"_ he groused. "I meant why hadn't he gone all Delta Dalton and rescued us?"

"You two, be quiet," Anton snapped.

Riley's glare would have cut the man dead had it been any sharper or more disdainful, but she decided there was no percentage in arguing with a guy pointing a gun at her back.

They marched along in silence for a long while. As the approached the ravine Gio had directed Anton to, the trees thinned a bit and Riley started grinning.

"What are you smiling about?" Bozer whispered.

She tilted her head ever so slightly off to the left. "We're okay."

Bozer casually squinted at the trees. "Huh?"

"Jack."

"I don't see …"

"I thought I told you two to shut up," Anton growled.

"Shutting up. No problem," Riley returned.

Riley caught Jack signaling that he was going to circle back behind them and she nodded almost imperceptibly.

Jack, for his own part, was glad that aging knees and a couple of recent rough solo missions, courtesy of Oversight, that his stealth was everything it had ever been. It was as uncomfortable as it ever was to see a woman he'd probably think of as his little girl until his dying day with some piece of shit pointing a gun at her back. And he was worried for Mac, too. Jack would, in his more vulnerable (and possibly drunken) moments tell you that he loved Mac just as fiercely and would probably even take his loss harder due to everything they'd been through together and the complexity of their relationship; their codependency, if Ri and Bozer were to be listened to.

Mac was different though. Jack has it in his head that Mac would be miserable with some safe sane life somewhere. And somehow that made it easier to see him doing the crazy stuff they did everyday. Those gunshots from a while ago had his blood running cold though. He had enough of an idea where the rest of them were, meaning where Mac was. He'd followed them this far only to let the big guy with the gun lead them to Mac.

They edged down the precarious ravine, the stones think with fresh precipitation. Jack nearly slipped and gave himself away twice. He could see smoke in the near distance, allowing him to zero in on his exact destination.

He managed a quick, damn near suicidal, course correction that got him down into the relatively level ground at the bottom of the ravine. He ducked for cover behind a huge mossy boulder and waited.

Riley passed in front of him first, followed almost immediately by Bozer. When the big hunk of muscle following them got even with his position, Jack launched himself at the guy, with every ounce of strength he had.

The fight for the gun seemed to happen in simultaneously slow motion and fast forward high speed. Jack as dimly aware that he was bleeding again from the knife wound, but that was a secondary concern to getting the weapon away from his opponent.

When another gunshot rang out closeby, Jack heard Bozer's exclamation, "Mac!"

Then he heard Riley's coolheaded, "C'mon!" and the sound of them both taking off running in that direction. _That's my girl,_ he thought with grim satisfaction. He didn't need to tell her that if he and Mac both needed help, he'd expect her to help Mac. The kid could hold his own in a fight, but he was more brains than brawn. Jack was born to fight. He thrived on it.

Both men somehow wound up back on their feet and Jack channeled his middle school footballer self and swung into the other guy in a messy ill placed tackle.

Then the gun between them went off.


	7. Chapter 7

Hours passed. Mac's hands were stiff from making rope and lashing broken branches together to form a sleigh type conveyance for the nearly quarter ton of money. There was nowhere he didn't hurt from the miles of hiking and the frequent beatings. He was hungry. Worse, he was thirsty. And he knew he was dehydrated from the excessive activity combined with being given extremely spare amounts of water. His physical condition was keeping his thoughts from being as clear as he liked them.

One thing he was sure of though, he had to act. Gio had shown himself to be capable of cold-blooded murder. Mac figured that as soon as Gio got a good look at how Mac used the sled he'd made it wouldn't be long before Gio figured he didn't need Mac anymore. And it was pretty obvious at this point that help wasn't coming. A gunshot close by made both he and his captor jump. Gio was looking around wildly and Mac figured it was now or never.

In a last ditch effort to gain an advantage, Mac dropped the rope, laced with fireweed, into the fire. It caught immediately and spread quickly to the crate. Gio screamed, "My money!" and started toward the crate, more on greedy instinct than with any kind of plan.

Mac used the man's single minded distraction and threw himself at him in the kind of running tackle Jack always seemed to favor. They skidded across the damp ground, locked in a grappling struggle, throwing punches, elbows, whatever either could do to gain advantage over the other. Mac had youth and strength on his side, not to mention years of training, but Gio had his rage and an all consuming desire to walk away with that eighteen million dollars. It made them more equally matched than Mac had been hoping for.

They struggled for several long minutes, gaining their feet and then tussling on the ground again. When Gio got his hands back on his gun and turned it on him, Mac did what he could to keep it from being a kill shot, but he sort of knew he was going to be hit even before Gio squeezed the trigger.

It was weird. He could feel warm blood oozing down his cold leg, but at the moment it didn't hurt. All it did was reaffirm his certainty that Gio would be more than happy to kill him. Mac knocked the gun away and got back on his feet more easily than he had before the bullet ripped into his leg.

 _Maybe I was wrong. Maybe he missed_ , Mac thought.

Then his brain answered him in Jack's voice, something it often did when they were separated on missions. _Or maybe that's adrenaline, dumbass. Put him down before he finishes the job._

He realized at least part of his brain knew he'd been hurt even if he wasn't feeling it yet, because his imaginary partner's voice had the pissed off freaked out sound it had in the real world at places like Lake Como, or after the VX gas in New York, or … or Cairo.

 _You bet, Sarge,_ he bantered back in his head.

He took a swing and connected solidly with Gio's jaw, sending the man stumbling. Mac had a half second to feel victorious over the hit before his leg started to buckle. Gio saw his advantage and kicked out, sweeping Mac's legs out from under him.

Mac nearly fell in the fire. Out of the corner of his eye he saw Gio scramble back to his feet and scoop his gun up off the ground. Instead of rolling away from the flames, he rolled toward them. Without really thinking, he grabbed a hot coal and hurled it at Gio.

He was vaguely aware of his enemy screaming, clutching at his face, and still, working to level his gun at Mac. Operating on sheer will and adrenaline, Mac got to his feet again, palming a rock on his way up. Gio squeezed off another shot, but this one went harmlessly into the ground. He brought the barrel back up again, but Mac managed to get close enough to crack him in the temple with the rock.

Almost as soon as Gio crumpled to the ground, Mac was overwhelmed by the burning pain in his leg. That, combined with hunger, thirst, and the rest of what had happened to him started his vision graying around the edges. He took one more stubborn step, not even really sure what he intended to do next. Then, his world went from grey to black.

He had no idea how long he lay there like that. Being cold wasn't a good metric. He'd been cold for hours and was probably at least mildly in shock. Then he processed hands on him.

His immediate mental impulse was to pull away, to scramble back, digging for purchase with his feet. His body didn't support that course of action. So instead of hitting fight or flight, he tried to pry his eyes open. Kind of.

He heard panicked breathy calling of his name in two familiar voices. "Mac! Mac! Mac! Mac! Mac."

He wanted to respond to the concern he heard there. He tried harder to open his eyes.

"He's been shot."

"He's still alive."

"Mac." He tried to answer. He couldn't quite get there though. His mind rebelled at waking fully to the pain he knew he was in for.

Then Ri said sharply, "Mac!"

Independent of any conscious thought, his eyes slitted open "Hey," he rasped.

"Hey," Riley grinned on pure relief.

Mac took in Bozer's tattered coat and the hint of pain tightening the corners of Riley's eyes. He managed blearily, "You guys are okay?

"It's not us we're worried about," Riley said with a combination of amusement that his first words were about anything other than his own condition and frustration about the same thing. She realized she sounded more like Jack than she was entirely comfortable with.

Before she could tease him about turning her into a Dalton, Bozer interrupted, " _Okay_? You got a bullet in your leg."

Mac groaned, making himself open his eyes to get a look at it. "Yeah, I guess I do."

He winced and puffed out a short pained breath when the movement sent a lightning strike of pain up and down that leg. _That's not awesome._ Something else occurred to him suddenly. "Jack?"

Riley tensed fractionally. "He's on his way, Mac." She fervently hoped that was true. "Do me a favor and don't hit me."

"Why would I ..?"

"I'm gonna take a look at your leg." She didn't give him any time to protest. She look out the pocket knife he'd given her at the trailhead and cut away his pant leg enough to assess the damage. "Shit," she mumbled more to herself than anything. "There's just an entrance wound."

"Mmmm," was all Mac managed. Just her jostling it felt like someone holding a blow torch against his thigh.

Bozer sounded freaked out enough that Mac made himself pry his eyes open when his roommate practically begged, "You need to tell us how to take it out."

Mac tried to sit up and wound up just groaning loudly. "You don't." He shook his head to emphasize how very bad that particular idea was, eyes closing again with pain and fatigue.

"We stop the bleeding, as much as we can. Then we get him the hell off this mountain."

Mac's eyes flew open again. "Jack! You're okay. Ri looked like she was lying when she said you were coming."

Jack gingerly lowered himself to the ground next to Mac. "Jesus, kid, you've had the worst luck with firearms the last couple years. You break a mirror again or somethin'?"

Mac actually smiled a little at that. "Usually." He realized he was shivering now. _Not good, Mac. Get a move on._ "Belt?"

Jack was already taking it off. "Way ahead of you, pal."

When he pulled it free from his belt loops, his breath hissed through his teeth.

Riley turned. "Jack?" She realized he was sticky with fresh blood. "Jack!"

Mac forced himself up on to his elbow, gasping with the effort. "You're hurt."

"I'm fine," he said with an unconcerned wave. "Most of this ain't mine," he gestured at his bloody T-shirt.

"Most?" Mac demanded, Then was forced to lay back down by a nauseating wave of pain. Getting shot really sucked. This one felt worse than when Murdoc tagged his shoulder, probably because the bullet was lodged in there moving every time he did. Pretty sad when your life included enough bullet wounds that you could play a game of comparative misery in your head.

Jack put a hand on his shoulder. "I got a little dinged up, knocked around. The blood is from that brick shithouse losing a wrestling match for his crappy .38. Like who still uses revolvers anymore?"

Mac chuckled his relief that Jack wasn't hurt worse, then bit his lip, moaning softly. "Ah, Hell."

Bozer ripped some more fabric off his already threadbare jacket. "We should get him bandaged up. That's a lot of blood."

"Have to dress it," Mac said, shaking his head. "Bullet's still in there. More bleeding, high risk of infection."

"What do we dress it with?" Riley asked. She was reasonably comfortable with the emergency aid basics, but only when there was a kit at her disposal.

"Yarrow," Mac breathed after thinking about it for a long minute.

"Yarrow?" Bozer looked a little incredulous that they were still being expected to forage in the face of a gunshot wound.

"That the plant you used when I got hit with that arrow in Wales?" Jack asked.

Mac nodded, eyes closing again, most of his will focused on regulated his breathing and not just passing out again. "Helps prevent infection, encourages clotting," he panted, unable to turn off his need to explain, to tell, to teach.

Jack patted his shoulder again, and started to rise. "It's white. Grows in clusters."

"Sit!" Riley snapped at him, giving him a Matty-worthy glare.

Mac looked at both of them at the heat in her voice. "Jack?" was all he could manage at the moment.

Riley answered for him. " _Dinged up_ is Dalton for sliced from hip to hip with some asshole's dirty boot knife!" she said hotly.

"Aw, I'm alright, honey," Jack replied, starting to his feet again.

"I said sit, goddamn it." It was an order; maybe the first real one he'd ever heard her give. "You're bleeding again. You've got more training than any of us at field medicine. Do not make it any harder for me to get Mac off this mountain."

Chastened, Jack just nodded, "Yes'm." He almost smiled then. She wasn't treating him like Jack, she was treating him like an asset. Well, mostly. She was worried about him too. But ahe was keeping a tight lid on it in the face of Mac's much more serious injury. All grown up. _Damn_. "You guys get the plants then. I'm gonna get a better look at Mac's leg."

Mac groaned, and Jack wasn't sure if it was in fresh pain or in anticipation of what he knew was coming. Regardless, Jack moved closer as Bozer and Riley scattered to find the plants he wanted.

"Hey, bud," Jack said softly.

"You really okay?"

"Course I am." Jack shook his head. "You know talkin' is not a good stalling tactic with me, right?"

"Stalling?"

"I've gotta get some pressure on this, kid."

"Mmmmm," he agreed, his jaw already tightening. Then he forced his eyes open again to look at Jack. "I know."

Jack took the scrap of jacket Bozer had torn off, eyeing the dirty fabric dubiously. "I'm sorry as hell, kid," he said and without further preamble, he pressed it to the wound. Mac's head snapped back, scraping the ground again and he bit back a groan. "Too much?"

Mac's eyes squeezed shut tighter for a second. He could still feel blood oozing around Jack's fingers. "I … No. Not enough." He gasped. "Still bleeding a lot."

Jack nodded, not much liking it, but also trusting Mac's judgment. "Alright, bud. Here we go."

Mac panted through the first second or two of increased pressure, glad Jack knew what he was doing and kept it steady so the bullet didn't wander around any more than it already had. Then the pain got to be too much and he cried out. If his eyes had been open he'd have seen Jack grimace almost as much as he was. Mac managed not to just pass out, but he thought it was a pretty near thing.

"That's more like it," he said opening his eyes and forcing the grin that made Jack grin back reflexively.

"You are seriously a glutton for punishment, Mac."

"Learned from the best," he said, letting his eyes close again.

Riley came back over with a handful of dingy damp plants. "Is this it?"

Mac squinted at it. "Yeah."

"Boze! I got it," she called and he trotted back over from where he'd been scouring the bushes.

"What do we do, now?"

"Okay," Mac said more as a mini pep talk to himself than anything else. He moaned a little as he rose on his elbows. "Now pack the wound and wrap it tight."

"I got this," Jack said, taking the plants from Riley. "Why don't you guys go see what you can do about making that sled thingy he was building a little more comfortable?"

"What for?" Bozer asked. Riley has already figured out Jack's plan and headed over to the contraption.

"We're miles out." Jack thought he did a reasonably good job at sounding like that didn't worry the living hell out of him. "We can't carry him that far … Well, we could, but we're more likely to move that bullet around and hurt him more if we do. Go help Ri, wouldja, Boze?"

Mac gave Jack a slightly grateful look for giving their teammates something to do that wasn't right on top of him. This was going to suck. He let out a long breath.

Jack squeezed his shoulder in sympathy. "You ready?"

"No …" he said, only about half joking. "Yeah."

"Okay, kid. Here we go," Jack said, partially warning Mac it was about to get miserable and partially to give himself another second to get his head right.

Mac's lips thinned into a tight colorless line and he just gave a nod, squeezing his eyes shut and clenching his jaw.

He groaned as Jack packed the yarrow into the wound. Things went grey in him again and he was only dimly aware of what Jack was doing. "Mmmm," was the most he said, more of a pained exclamation that an acknowledgment of any of Jack's familiar gentle chatter.

In a distant disinterested sort of way, Mac heard Jack call out to Riley, then her almost tentative question, "What can I do?"

His face was almost as sympathetic to Riley as it had been to Mac a moment ago. "I'm gonna need you to press down on this real hard while I get the belt around it."

"Like a tourniquet?" she asked a little shakily.

"Not quite that tight if I can help it. Think maybe he'd like to keep this leg." She widened her eyes. "The bleeding's not that bad, Ri. Just pressure. It'll keep the bullet in there stable and once it's on there it actually helps the pain a little. Gettin' there just isn't a lot of fun."

"Okay." She placed her hands where Jack's were and pressed.

"Harder," Jack encouraged.

She cringed but applied more pressure.

"That's good," Jack said when Mac moaned quietly. He cinched his belt around Mac's leg and Riley removed her hands at the last second so Jack could pull it tight.

Completely unable to help it, though he tried, Mar cried out sharply several times as Jack got the belt buckles. "Sorry, Mac," he said, really sounding it.

At least the pain had focused him this time rather than loosening his tenuous grip on consciousness. "That's okay," he assured them both.

Jack tugged Mac's pant leg up over his calf. "What're you doing?" Riley asked.

"Making sure he still has a pulse in his ankle. Like i said ... Pretty sure he'd like to keep the leg, huh, Mac". Mac rolled his eyes, then winced as Jack accidentally turned his leg a little. "That'll do," Jack said as soon as he felt the rapid beat under his finger tips. He glanced up as Bozer dragged the sled up next to them. "Now the hard part, pal."

"Getting down off the mountain?" Mac asked almost lightly.

"Getting your sorry ass the the nearest hospital," Jack said, groaning a little himself as he got to his feet.

"That's harder than climbing down this mountain?" Bozer asked, stepping around the sled and positioning himself by Mac's feet.

"Usually," Jack said with a teasing double raise of his eyebrows as he got his hands under Mac's arms.

"Jackass," Mac groused. "I'm not that bad and you … aaaaahhhh!" He cried out as they lifted him, coordinating their movements through some unspoken communication Mac had missed.

"Sorry, kid," Jack said as they eased him onto their makeshift stretcher.

Mac didn't answer or try to reassure him; he was afraid if he opened his mouth he was going to throw up. He closed his eyes again too, leaning his head back against the rough wood frame. He couldn't even find it in himself to protest when they laid their coats over his shivering form.

"Which way gets us out of here the fastest?" Riley asked, not liking the sort of grey green color Mac had just turned when they moved him, or how still he was being.

Jack waved in the general direction of the trailhead. "If we head that way, it should be pretty smooth going and it'll take us right back to Freddie's place." He moved to get behind the sled to push it, but he stumbled, clutching his middle with both hands. They came away bloody.

Riley wasn't about to even argue with him. "Hey, Mac, scoot over a little if you can."

"Hmm?" he asked vaguely, but did inch to one side just a bit.

"Alright, Old Man, climb on."

"I'm fine, Ri," he protested. "I don't …"

"I dont wanna hear it." She held up a hand. "Didn't I just hear you pick on Mac for being terrible about going to the hospital?"

"I … I'm not …"

"Now."

"Fine," he huffed, carefully arranging himself on the sled next to Mac.

"You can tell yourself you're riding along to keep him from falling off if that makes you feel better."

He glanced at Mac and seeing how his features had gone slack again and noting that he wasn't getting in on the conversation he realized that might be true. "Alright," he sighed. "Let's move out."

Riley and Bozer shared a concerned glance as they started pushing the sled down the mountain, going as fast as they dared.


	8. Chapter 8

Mac wove in and out of consciousness on the trip down the mountain. Headed down a steep embankment the sled hit a rock, bouncing hard when it landed. "Ah, ow," he complained to no one in particular.

"Hang in there, kid," said a warm familiar voice.

He opened his eyes, half expecting to find himself already in a hospital room, having conked out and missed the unpleasant finale to the mission. _No such luck._

"Hey, Jack."

His thoughts felt sluggish, slow, almost drugged, but both the scenery zipping past them and the and the almost intolerable ache in his leg told him that couldn't be so. _Blood loss? Hypothermia? Concussion? Shock? Some convoluted Venn diagram of all of the above?_ He wasn't sure, but contrary to Jack's teasing he was pretty much totally looking forward to getting to the hospital and letting somebody who made a living figuring that stuff out deal with the problem. Hopefully while he was knocked out cold.

"How you holdin' up, Mac?"

"M'okay. How bout you? Hurt bad?"

Not even full sentences. And the kid looked like shit. He didn't remember asking after Jack before either. "Not too bad, kid. Shallow cut. Ri's just being a big ole mother hen."

Mac snorted. "Wonder where she gets that from."

That sounded a little more lucid, a little more like Mac. "I don't know what you're talkin' about," he said with a teasing lilt. Then, hoping maybe for a change, Mac would just fess up and simplify matters when they finally got to help, he added, "While we're on the subject of mother hens …" He paused and Mac gave him a very deliberate eye roll that actually made Jack feel better. "What else?"

"Hmmm?" Mac asked like he didn't know exactly what his partner meant.

"Nice try, hot shot. Other than the bullet, what else do we need to know about when we get you to help?"

"Mmmmm," Mac mumbled, closing his eyes again.

He was tired, and he hurt everywhere, and he really just kind of wanted it to be tomorrow already. Because in tomorrow Future Mac was full of painkillers and all this was over with. He realized Present Mac's thoughts weren't a hundred percent making sense. He also realized that he'd get to Future Mac full of painkillers faster if he just unloaded now. So he sighed. Then he made himself open his eyes.

"Dehydrated … Beat up pretty good. Maybe concussion, busted up ribs. Kinda burned my hand … And you mentioned the bullet … So, also maybe … Generally pissed off. But I don't think there's anything a doctor can do for that."

Jack chuckled softly at that. "Anything else?"

"Pretty much proud as Hell of Bozer and Riley for keeping it together and helping you come after me."

"Helping? I gotta be honest with you, Mac, they did a lot of the heavy lifting. Especially Ri. She really took all those lectures and reading assignments of yours to heart, followed that trail of breadcrumbs you left right to ya. And I think she's startin' to realize she's good at more than just her boopity boop stuff." Mac smiled a little at that. "Although her and Boze might both hold a grudge about the cattails."

Mac chuckled and shook his head. "How pissed do you think they'll be when we tell them you can cook 'em and they taste just like the really good water chestnut appetizer at Yao's?"

"Prob'ly pretty pissed … So maybe don't tell 'em till you're off crutches, huh, kid?" Mac smiled vaguely again. Jack paused, taking in that Mac was having a hard time keeping his eyes open. They hit another bump and Mac paled another shade, biting back a yelp. "Almost there, kid."

"That's good," he said, with another tired sigh.

Mac figured it would still be awhile until help arrived. He'd helped out on a search and rescue up here about a year ago and once they'd found the kids it had taken over an hour to get emergency services to them. And the staging area had been reasonably close by.

 _You've already lost a lot of blood_ , his brain supplied helpfully in a voice he recognized but refused to acknowledge at first. Then it went on, saying something he'd all too recently heard it say in person, sitting across from its owner on the wrong side of an executive desk. _Your Overwatch needs to do a better job keeping you in one piece. First you get kidnapped by Murdoc, for the second time I might add, then you can't even take a long weekend in Vegas without getting into trouble. The reality is, Angus …_

"Shut up, Dad," he grumbled, not meaning to say it out loud, but wanting to still the unwelcome voice in his head.

Jack's eyes flashed with real concern. "What was that, bud?"

"Nothing," he said more distinctly when he realized he'd spoken.

Jack would have pressed but the ground leveled out and he realized they were in the parking lot of Freddie's store. Bozer and Riley increased their speed now that they were on a reasonably flat surface, calling out to Freddie loudly.

Mac opened his eyes again as they skidded to a stop and Freddie came rushing down the steps. He was aware of Jack getting up from beside him and trying to explain to Freddie what had happened and of Riley on the phone with Matty. _That's good,_ he thought. _Matty will be way faster than 911 out here anyways._

Freddie helped him take a drink from a cold bottle of water. It was an effort just to lift his head to do it. He was glad he did though. He didn't think a cold beer at the end of the longest day of yard work in the heat of an LA summer had ever tasted better.

"Thanks."

"Help is on the way, Mac," Freddie assured him. Mac just nodded his thanks, letting his head sink back, so tired now he didn't even think the frame felt all that hard. Then he heard Freddie say to Jack, "Must've been pretty damned bad out there. I don't know about you, but I'm a hell of a lot more used to him bringing people who look like something the cat dragged off the mountain than I am to seeing _anything_ out there get the better of him."

Then Riley knelt down next to him. "He does look a little dragged," she said in a teasing tone. It sounded forced, but he appreciated her effort at keeping up the usual tenor of their team. "But less by a cat and more by a couple of wilderness newbies. Hopefully the next part of the trip will be smoother. Matty has a medevac on its way from Portland. Sorry about the rough ride, Mac."

Mac took another drink of water, this time from Bozer who was hovering, fidgeting, and reminding Mac of his eleven year old self. He managed a grin at them both. "Rough? You guys did great out there. You _definitely_ pass."

"Only you could possibly still be thinking about why we came out here in the first place," Riley said with an affectionate smirk.

"Hey, I'm the one who's gonna have to do the paperwork." He shifted slightly to try to get more comfortable. "Ow, damn it," he breathed.

"You take it easy, Mac. The rescue folks are in bound. They'll be here soon," Jack said, giving his shoulder a squeeze.

He closed his eyes, listening to Riley start grilling Jack about his own injuries, and lecturing him for getting up off the sled to wander around the parking lot bleeding.

He drifted off again to Jack's usual minimizing bravado. "Ah, Hell, honey, I've cut myself worse shavin'."

0-0-0

Mac had hazy impressions of the helicopter landing, of being loaded on board, of Jack arguing with someone. It was noisy and he was uncomfortable. But he was also liberally medicated and warm under heated blankets.

Then there was a rougher than he cared for landing due to wind, if the chatter he overheard was not filtered through medication inaccurately. Lights passing too quickly over his head, making him feel woozy. He thought he maybe remembered getting as far as the operating room before everything went totally dark again, but he had to admit that was just as likely a dream as anything else he experienced over the next twelve or so hours. So many of his dreams blended reality with unpleasant facets of his imagination.

 _Mac made his way to the executive suite, his posture almost overly straight and sure. The summons had been polite, but cold._

 _After they'd gotten Griggs into custody and Matty got them extfil back to Phoenix he'd spent hours in Medical. A few xrays, some IV fluids, a totally forgettable meal, and several lectures later, he'd had enough._

 _Jack was racked out in the bed next door, waiting on results from some scan or another to make sure they hadn't liquified any important organs with their battering ram stunt or something. Jack hated those imaging machines. Said it was like being buried alive. They'd let him have a sedative and Mac suspected he'd be out until the morning. That stuff always hit Jack hard._

 _For his own part, Mac still hurt all over, and couldn't quite get over being hungry and thirsty. He was also fed up with being someplace he didn't want to be with anyone telling him he couldn't leave. Nothing was broken, he wasn't bleeding internally, and he didn't want anything stronger than Tylenol anyway._

 _He waited until shift change, got dressed, made sure Jack's phone was on silent and texted him that he would be at home so he wouldn't worry, then slipped out in the busyness of staff handing off patients and briefing in the night crew._

 _The first phone call came when he was still in the back of the Uber he'd called to get him home. "Hey Matty," he answered, doing his best 'everything's cool' nonchalant voice._

" _Don't you 'hey' me, MacGyver. I came down to Medical to check on you and Dalton and brief you on Griggs condition and you were gone!"_

" _They were done with me," he hedged, sounding less nonchalant. In fact, as Jack would say, he sounded chalant as Hell._

" _You have_ not _been discharged, Mac." He heard her take a deep breath; there was real concern for him in her voice, but something else, too._

" _I'm fine, Matty, honestly."_

" _Mmm," she grumbled skeptically. "I need you to come back in anyway."_

" _Matty, I'm not …"_

" _Oversight wants to see you."_

 _Mac paused to get out of the car, having already tipped generously in the app, he just gave the driver a friendly wave. "Tell him I'm fine, too. Or if he's really worried, he's welcome to come over. I'll be up for a while."_

" _In his official capacity, Mac," she said, her voice taking on more concern, and a tinge of regret._

" _Oh." His father thinking of him as an agent first and his kid second was an old feeling by now. Still, he knew his disappointment showed when he answered her. "If he wants to do the debrief, I'll come in when it's set up."_

 _A long silence followed as he let himself into the house and locked the door behind him. "Mac, he's not very happy you left and he said …"_

" _Does he want to debrief right now?" Mac asked a little sharply._

" _No, but …"_

" _So, like I said, I'll be in when it's set up."_

 _She sighed, letting him hear it. "I'll tell him." She paused. "Get some rest at least, will you?"_

" _Yes, ma'am." He ended the call._

 _He managed to keep his promise to Matty and actually go to bed, although it was nearly sunrise when he did. When he awoke in the middle of the morning, there was a text from his father's work number. "My office. 11 am. Don't be late."_

 _He scrolled down his notifications and the next one made him smile. "What the hell were you thinking? You text me as soon as you're up!" followed by four lines of aggressive emojis._

 _That one he answered. "I had a great sleep. In my own bed. Need a ride?"_

 _Then he simply texted, "Affirmative," to Oversight, and went into his bathroom for the world's longest, most necessary fourth shower of the last twenty-four hours._

 _When he squared his shoulders and strode into James MacGyver's office, he knew his eyes narrowed at the boss's expectant expression. James raised an eyebrow at Mac's bruised and tired countenance. "Your Overwatch needs to do a better job of keeping you in one piece."_

 _He felt his jaw hardening in the old familiar way that he'd hoped they would one day leave behind. Instead of the respectful if reserved opening he knew Oversight was expecting, he sat down without being invited. "Maybe he could if you didn't keep separating us on missions."_

 _His father stood from behind his desk and appeared to grow until he filled the room. Mac felt himself shrinking into the chair. Not metaphorically, but physically shrinking. He knew then this encounter had to be a dream. But it didn't feel like one._

 _In dreams you weren't supposed to be sore from a car wreck, weren't supposed to be able to smell your father's aftershave that always reminded you of your mother, weren't supposed to feel nervous sweat pooling in the small of your back._

 _His giant-father-boss glared down at him from the ceiling. "I'll do whatever I want about missions. Your life is mine, Angus. It always has been. You'll go in whatever direction I tell you. Just like you always have."_

Mac gasped and his eyes snapped open. He couldn't see the clock on the wall across the dimly lit private hospital room Matty had secured for him. But the hushed sounds and dark outside his window said it was still night, or at least extremely early morning.

The ache in his wounded leg and all along his torso told him it was probably the latter and nearly time for them to come around and offer him more pain medication. He was going to decline and see if he could get the ball rolling to get back to LA.

Matty had called last night after he'd gotten out of surgery. He only had vague memories of her well wishes and of her apologizing for needing to call Bozer and Riley back to the office as soon as they were medically cleared. He'd still been too dopey from anesthesia to follow the conversation. He distinctly remembered Jack's face though when she'd asked to speak with him. He'd gone pale, patted Mac's arm, mouthed that he'd be right back, and slipped out of the room. Mac tried to stay awake to find out what was up, but between the pull of pain medicine and the remnants of surgical sleep, not to mention the stress and physical abuse of his stint on the mountain, his eyes closed completely without his permission.

Now his eyes searched the almost dark. The chair next to his bed was empty, as was the second bed they'd moved another patient out of because they hadn't had any actual private rooms available. He felt the tingling of real worry start to knit his eyebrows together. Would Oversight really have had Matty call Jack away again, like he had so many times lately, right from his bedside only hours after he'd been shot?

 _Yeah, he would. You know he would. And it looks like he did._ Mac got as far as being a little pissed off about it and sort of upset that Jack would just go without a word to him. Then the door to his room opened, and a familiar silhouette tiptoed toward the chair nearest the wall. Mac smelled coffee. He grinned. Jack clearly didn't notice that his eyes were open. Or maybe he couldn't see it in the dark.

He waited until Jack had quietly situated himself in the chair, gotten himself comfortable, and sipped his coffee. Then, at normal volume, he said cheerfully, "Morning, Jack."

Jack jumped and spilled some of his coffee. He swore, then got up, brushing the hot liquid off his front. "Ah, Hell. That hurts, you little shit."

He didn't sound upset though, so Mac just grinned more,turned on the light, and carefully adjusted the bed to sitting. "I guess you probably couldn't be convinced to go get me a coffee too, then."

"I guess maybe prob'ly not! Guys who scare the living hell out of their partners have to wait for staff to get them coffee."

"I'm sorry I startled you, man." Mac held up his hands apologetically. But Jack was always jumping out and trying to scare him so it had felt kind of perfect.

"Not that, smartass. Gettin' yourself nabbed and shot!"

"Oh, yeah. That." He grinned sheepishly and shrugged a little. "Do I get to give you a hard time for getting stabbed out there then?"

Jack raises an eyebrow at him. "I didn't get stabbed."

"Yeah, you … on the mountain you said …" He frowned. "Riley and the mother hen thing … Did he dream that?" His face lined with confusion, and what Jack could see was underlying physical pain.

Jack let him off the hook. "You didn't dream it, bud. I got sliced up a little bit it's all taken care of. I'm guessin' your dreams have been less than fun anyway though. You've been mumbling a lot."

Mac shrugged and looked away. Part of him wanted to tell Jack about the dream about his father. Mostly because he wanted to tell Jack about the real conversation he'd had with him where Mac got the distinct impression Oversight was trying to split up their team and had been for a while. Another part was just embarrassed that his nightmares were so apparent. "You know drugs always do that to me. Especially anesthesia."

Jack nodded thoughtfully. "Yeah, unfortunately you look like a guy who could use some more pain meds about now. Dreams or not. You could page the nurse, kid. It's not that early."

Another shrug. "Nah. I'm good. I'll take some Tylenol or something when I get out of here."

Jack smirked and shook his head. "You're gonna go without pain relief for a week, huh?"

"A week?" Mac scoffed. "I'm fine to get out of here. I want to get back to LA. I'm perfectly capable of taking my prescribed medications, changing my bandages, all that stuff. Not exactly the first time something like this has happened."

"Well, yeah, that's true. But, the docs don't know that. The doc who got the bullet out last night told me six to ten days here. That's their average stay. And as far as they know, you're just an average guy."

Mac sighed. That was true. He also had to admit that now that some time had passed with him really awake, his leg hurt quite a bit more, and he was feeling every other bump and bruise too. "I know, but …"

"I could call Matty, see if we could get you transferred to Phoenix," he hedged. "Foster's on vacation so odds are nobody there would piss you off too much."

"No, I don't think …" he trailed off. "I don't think I want to be a captive audience for anyone at Phoenix right now, actually."

"Somethin' going on that I should know about? Jack asked with concern.

"No … Not really." He decided he wasn't ready to let Jack know what he suspected was going on with Oversight. It would just piss Jack off, and Mac wasn't in any kind of shape to chase down his partner to talk sense to him. He gave Jack the expected eyeroll. "I'm not interested in exchanging one set of bossy nurses for another. Phoenix's are way worse."

Jack just chuckled. "I think maybe you're right, kid." He pulled his chair closer and put his feet up on Mac's bed, careful not to jostle his leg. "That mean when they offer you're gonna be sensible and take something instead of sitting here making that face all day?"

"What face?" Mac asked defensively.

"You know what face. The this hurts like hell but if I say so it's gonna be more trouble than it's worth face." He gave Mac a speculative look. "And you know it ain't. Not everybody is your … Oversight."

Mac's eyes widened a little when Jack got so close to the things that were on his mind. "I …" He cleared his throat. "I guess I probably will take something."

"Good man," Jack grinned his approval, itching absently at the tape across his bandaged stomach.

Mac smirked. "That doesn't mean I'm planning on spending six days here, just so you know. It just means I'm not planning on leaving this morning."

"This morning?" An eyebrow climbed.

"Fine," he huffed. "Today."

"If the usual is six days, how about you give me at least half that?"

Mac grinned and shook his head a little. "Maybe."

"I'll take it. In fact, maybe I _will_ go getcha a coffee as a reward for good behavior."

"Now you're talking, partner."

Jack got up and headed out the door, ostensibly to go get him some coffee. When a perky nurse who looked way to happy to be working at this ungodly hour stepped into his room less than a minute later, he knew it had probably been a pretext. He must not have been doing as good a job at keeping his misery under wraps as he'd thought.

He did his best to smile pleasantly and answer all her questions while she took his vitals, and changed out his IV fluids. He thanked her for offering to get him some pain medication and accepted, saying he'd rather not have the stuff that would make him all dopey. "My girlfriend's gonna call this morning. I don't wanna be half asleep."

The lie came out very naturally. The motherly woman smiled brightly at him telling him she'd thought he looked like a sweet thoughtful boy and then asked the appropriate questions about the lucky lady in question. Mac thought he did a good job of keeping his story up and winning an ally. He'd casually mention that he had a first date anniversary coming up and he'd hoped to pop the question. Nurse Ivy would doubtless bend over backwards to help him get his walking papers a little early for that.

She told him she'd go check the orders and be right back with something. She also assured him breakfast would be around shortly. He'd given her a sunny smile and thanked her as she left.

He lay back, thinking. He needed to figure out what was going on with Jack. Even more, he needed to figure out what to do about Oversight and his own lingering feelings of unease around his return to Phoenix and his father's role in his life.

He plastered on a smile he wasn't quite feeling when Jack came back with his coffee and a contraband jelly donut. "Thanks, pal."

"Any time, kid."

He took a bite of donut and a swallow of coffee. The smile become more genuine. "Thanks for coming after me out there."

"Of course I can after you, ya big dumb genius. I'm your Overwatch. I've always got your six, Mac. We're partners."

Always. That was a good word. And for a man who took giving his word as seriously as Jack Dalton, Mac knew he could count on it.

A/N - I really enjoyed writing this tag. I may take up the hobby of writing tags to the episodes to put Jack back with the team where he belongs. In any event, hope you enjoyed this one. ~ J


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